


i'll come around if you ever want to be in love

by wonderously



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Film Student Louis, M/M, Musician Harry, Pining, University Student Harry, University Student Louis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-16
Updated: 2014-12-16
Packaged: 2018-03-01 19:48:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 39,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2785565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wonderously/pseuds/wonderously
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis is a film student, Harry is a musician, and shooting a music video doesn't help on the path of trying not to fall in love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'll come around if you ever want to be in love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nouiiam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nouiiam/gifts).



> Hello!!!! Okay so this is my first ever fic that I've finished so I hope it isn't too glaringly amateur, and I hope that the person who gave me this prompt and all of you enjoy it.

It is just a fact of life that everyone gets homesick once in a while. Even if you hate where you grew up, even if terrible things happened to you there, sometimes you find yourself missing little things, like the way that the grocery store sometimes had a funky smell to it because the pet store was right next door and they did free dog washes on Saturdays and food and wet dog do not mix well or the billboard that was always empty that you passed on your way to school every morning or the grouchy old man who lived across the road.

It’s a Saturday morning when Louis finds himself curled up in a dorm room that looks too much like a prison cell, terribly terribly homesick. These feelings aren’t new to him; it’s his second year in uni, and usually after two years of something Louis would have learned how to cope with it, but homesickness is one thing he can never seem to get over. It hits him in the oddest of moments, sometimes in the middle of class, sometimes walking down the sidewalk, sometimes lying in bed at night, but it always sends him into a crippling state of sadness and has him quite literally crying for his mother.

Thankfully he has sentiments of home with him in London, nearly two hours away from Doncaster, even if it is just another person.

Zayn understands how Louis gets. He misses home sometimes too, though he was never as close to his family as Louis was his, so it doesn’t get to him quite as often. But as it stands, Zayn is the only person who can drag Louis back into the real world after one of these days.

“Lou, you’ve got to get up, unless you wanna look like shit for the festival in a few hours.” Zayn is standing above Louis’ bed, jabbing at his middle with his index finger.

“Thanks Zayn. Love the confidence boost. Not all of us can be as effortlessly gorgeous as you, you know.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Zayn groans, flopping down on the bed next to Louis, apparently giving up on his former tactic of annoying Louis until he snaps and gets up just to get Zayn off his back. “But honestly, when is the last time you’ve even taken a shower? You can’t present your film looking like you just dunked you head in a bucket of grease. What will Harry think-“

“Fine!” Louis exclaims. “I’ll go get a fucking shower, Jesus Christ.” He continues to grumble as he pulls himself out of bed and down the hall to the communal shower, not even bothering to look at Zayn’s face again. He knows what he would see – that stupid smug, knowing expression Zayn always gets when he brings up the H-word.

He manages to shower himself by muscle memory, arms moving up and down his body then up to his hair in a normal routine, only letting the nerves overtake him once he steps back out of the shower and is drying his hair in front of one of the tiny mirrors hung above the sinks.

This day has been looming over him for nearly a year now and he has had plenty of time to mentally prepare himself for it, but now that it is finally here, all the nerves that he had previously pushed away and locked up in the back of his mind are rushing through the floodgates, and his chest feels so tight he thinks he might throw up.

What if they hate it? What if it’s so awful that everyone turns it into a joke and he’ll be the laughing stock of the school for the next two years? “Hey guys look, it’s Louis Tomlinson, the worst director on the planet! Let’s all beat him up and steal his wallet!”

He switches the blow dryer off even though his hair is not completely dry yet and hurries back to his dorm room, not wanting to look at his reflection anymore. Zayn must notice his anxious pallor, because when Louis starts rummaging around in the small chest at the foot of his bed for a halfway decent outfit, he throws a pillow at his face and tells him off for being nervous.

“Zayn, I’m going to be nervous and nothing you say will stop me. Go ahead and try but it won’t work.”

“Why are you so nervous anyway? You know how much Mrs. Samuels loves your work. Plus you’re the best in your class.”

“It’s terrible Zayn. A disgrace to humanity. And I’m only second best. Niall Horan beats me in everything I do, even breathing.”

“Oh, would you shut up?”

“You brought it up,” Louis points out, finally settling on a pair of black skinny jeans and a blue button-up. At least if they hate the film, he may be able to woo the crowd with his body and earn some reprieve.

“I brought it up cause you looked about three seconds from vomiting all over me, and I’ve already gotten ready and don’t fancy having someone empty their stomach all over me.” He tosses Louis’ shoes over to him where he is trying to sculpt his quiff with only the aid of the front-facing camera on his phone. “Hurry up, yeah? We’re gonna be late.”

As it turns out, they make it just in time for Zayn to get an alright seat and Louis to hurry away to the sound equipment to speak with his professor and make sure everything is good to go. Somehow now the nerves have calmed down. Maybe it’s how late it is; if they hate it, they hate it. It’s too late to do anything about it now. Louis still hopes at least some people enjoy it, though. He has spent two years in uni for film production and for all that to go to waste would be two years of Louis’ life (and an exorbitant amount of money) down the drain.

Someone claps him on the back. Louis turns to see who it is. A boy is beaming back at him, his face pale enough to rival Louis’ own current complexion. “Ready mate?”

“Ready, yeah,” Louis breathes. “You?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be, at least.”

Niall is another second year in his class and along with Louis he will be showing one of his films today at the festival. A number of other third and fourth years are having their films screened but they are the only two second years to do it, and the pressure on their backs to do well could quite possibly break their spines.

Unfortunately since they are the youngest, they have to wait until last to go, when most of the audience is either gone or bored. On second thought, maybe that makes it a fortunately - then not as many people will be there to witness his complete and utter failure.

The introductory credits of the first film start rolling when the sky completely darkens. The lights around campus dim to a dull glow with the first few notes of the background soundtrack.

Louis takes a seat with the rest of his fellow students and tries not to throw up everywhere.

-

Every film is great. Spectacular. To the untrained eye, not far lacking in the skills of today’s Hollywood movies. Which only means that with each film they sit through, Louis’ confidence sinks lower and lower. In one particularly impressive fight scene in a thirty minute long thriller, Louis debates “accidentally” destroying the copy of his own film and dropping out of university. Surely he can get a job at a retail office or something to make enough money to get by on.

But despite his anxiousness, the passage of time still flows as normal as ever, and within a few hours Niall’s film is finishing up and his starts to play. Louis swallows down around the impossibly large lump in his throat and sinks down farther in his seat.

Every word of dialogue spoken is like nails on a chalkboard to him and with every pan of the camera, Louis is cursing himself, rewriting the scene in his mind to how it could have been better, wondering how the hell he could have been so stupid to think this was good.

He was the only person who did a romance film. All the others were drama or horror or action. None of this teenage fantasy bullshit. Everyone in the audience is probably cringing at how cliché it is. He squeezes his eyes shut when the main character finally gets the kiss from her love interest and doesn’t open them again until the last notes of the final montage of love scenes fades out and is replaced by applause from the crowd.

Peeking one eye open, Louis dares to turn his head and take a look at the crowd. They’re not booing. They’re not running to the nearest farm to get pitchforks and torches to chase after him with. They’re clapping. A massive sigh of relief falls from his body and Louis’ limbs, which were previously rigid with tenseness, loosen out and he sits up in the seat.

Mrs. Samuels stands up in front of the screen, thanking everyone for coming and asking them to stay around for a little longer for the directors/students to say some final words. Niall and Louis take their place in line after the older students and wait their turn to say something.

This Louis can do. This he was able to prepare for. When he steps up to the mic stand, the rehearsed lines fall from his mouth with a practiced ease. “Hi, my name is Louis Tomlinson. I’m a second year here at the University of London. My film was the last one you just saw, actually, and I'm still in shock that I had the honor of presenting it to you all. I’d like to thank my good friends Liam Payne and Sophia Smith, who are coincidentally in a relationship and used every opportunity to ravish each other in front of the camera, for playing the lead roles. This couldn’t have been done without them and I appreciate their commitment to this project so much. I’d also like to thank Mrs. Samuels for being the greatest film professor I could ever ask for and my best friend Zayn Malik for forcing me to actually go through with this and not chicken out.”

Another round of applause welcomes his words and Louis takes a gracious, somewhat over-enthusiastic bow, biting down on the grin that is fighting to break out on his face. It’s over and he didn’t die. That deserves a round of applause on it’s on.

Then everything is over. Mrs. Samuels thanks everyone one last time and congratulates her students and the crowd disperses, everyone headed off in their own directions, some walking towards the dorm buildings, some towards the car park, others in the direction of the closest pub a few streets down.

Louis turns and the last thing he sees before he’s being tackled to the ground is Zayn’s face, split wide with a grin, screaming something that sounds vaguely like his name.

“Eurgh, Zayn, get off of me!”

“Louis!” Zayn shouts.

“Zayn!” he says back with mock enthusiasm, mimicking Zayn’s tone.

“It was so good! I’m so proud of you.”

“Are you now? I thought I was the ‘biggest burden of your life’?”

“Shut up. You were being a twat this morning.”

Louis rolls his eyes, squirming under his body to loosen Zayn’s grip. He lets himself have a smile, just a small one though, because he knows Zayn is exaggerating everything because he is his best friend and that’s what best friends  are supposed to do, but still a smile nonetheless. “Thanks though, Zayn. I appreciate it. Now let me up?”

“Never!” Zayn cries. He pins Louis’ wrists above his head before Louis has the chance to defend himself, and with his other hands digs his fingers into Louis’ side and tickles him. Tickles him, like they’re ten years old.

Louis screeches with laughter, because despite his age tickles are still tickles and he’s always been extremely ticklish. “Zayn!” he cries, gasping for air, dragging small gulps of air into his lungs between laughs. “Zayn! I hate you!” He pushes forward one last bout of energy and rolls, pushing Zayn onto the grass beside him, detaching his wrists from Zayn’s wrist and scrambling to his feet.

When Zayn doesn’t follow him like Louis expected, to tackle him back down the ground, Louis frowns. He didn’t hurt him, did he? Following Zayn’s eyes to where he is staring to some fixed point behind Louis’ shoulder, he turns in a one eighty and comes face to face with none other than Harry Styles.

Louis sucks in a breath, fumbling to straighten out his clothes, fix his hair, and compose himself all at once. Zayn snorts somewhere on the ground behind him and Louis tries to ignore him, focusing all his attention on Harry. Fuck. What is Harry Styles doing seeking him out?

“Uh, hi. You’re Louis Tomlinson right? I’m Harry Styles.”

“I – uh – yeah, I know. I mean, I’m not like – a stalker or anything, I just – we have English class together. Ms. Brown? I sit in the back of class near the door.”

Harry gives him an apologetic smile. “Sorry. I’m never really fully awake in that class though, so don’t take it personally.”

Louis forces a dry laugh. “Yeah. She does have a talent for sucking the energy out of everything.” When Harry smirks at his joke, fireworks go off inside of him and he has to hold back jumping up and down and doing a fist pump. Step one, have Harry Styles laugh at his joke, accomplished. Step two, have Harry Styles fall into hopeless infatuation with him, in progress.

“Anyway, I just wanted to say I really loved your film. It was really breathtaking – that scene on the beach? Couldn’t believe a uni student shot it and not a Hollywood director.”

“Yeah?” Louis blushes under the praise. If he had longer hair, he would most definitely be twirling a strand around his finger right now.

“Yeah,” Harry laughs. “I, um. I know we just met but I want to ask you a favor? You can say no if you want, of course, if you’re too busy or don’t want to or whatever.”

“Okay. No, yeah, ask away.” He would smile, but he really does not want to draw attention to his face due to the fact that it is burning with the brightest blush ever known to man. Not even a twelve year old girl talking to her crush would be able to out-blush Louis right now. Thank God the street lights are dim enough that it’s hard to make out complexions.

“I’m a music student, I don’t know if you knew that?” Louis shrugs nonchalantly, trying to hide that yes, he did know that. “Well I’m a music student. And for our final project everyone in my class is required to pen their own songs, lyrics and music, and make a video to play along with it. I was struggling with finding someone who could help me shoot that since none of my mates are that handy with a camera, but I saw your film and absolutely fell in love with it. Would you be willing to help me with it?”

Silence is all Louis can manage, vying to keep his mouth clamped shut instead of trying to speak and making a fool out of himself. Harry mistakes the silence for reluctance, though, and he hurries to backtrack.

“Obviously you don’t have to, since we’ve just met and whatnot, but if you did want to help me out I’d probably love you forever. And forever is a long time.”

Louis swallows hard. “Forever is a long time, yes. Very clever of you to notice.” He smirks when Harry rolls his eyes. “But yeah. The film for this festival was my final project, so I shouldn’t be very busy with anything else besides normal coursework. I’d love to help you.”

Harry’s face lights up. “Really? You’d do that?” Surging forward, he wraps his arms around a startled Louis and squeezes him tight into his body. When he pulls away, Louis has to pretend to fix his collar in order to duck his head, because even in this dim light he’s sure that Harry would be able to see his blush.

“I would, yes.”

“Thank you so much. I can’t tell you how grateful I am, Louis. This means so much to me.”

They exchange numbers, Harry adding the praying emoji to Louis’ contact name after Louis hands his phone back because Louis is “a gift sent from whatever god is looking down on us from above”, which draws a laugh out of Louis. As Harry walks away, Louis stares after him for as long is socially acceptable and maybe a bit longer, then flops down next to Zayn, who is still splayed out on the grass, his mouth wide open in an expression of disbelief.

“Shit, Lou."

"Shit," he agrees.

+++

On Sunday morning, Louis wakes up to his phone buzzing. Zayn is gone, at his morning lecture, so the room is empty and Louis doesn’t have anything to be embarrassed about when the buzzing startles him awake so abruptly that he rolls off his bed and hits the floor with a dull thud. He scrambles to find it in his sea of tangled up bed sheets and lifts it to his ear hurriedly, not even checking to see who was calling.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Louis? This is Harry.”

Louis curses under his breath and although Harry cannot see him, his free hand raises on instinct to his hair to try and sort out his bed head. “Yeah! How are you?”

“I’m alright. Sorry, did I wake you up?”

“No. I mean, yes, you did, but I needed to get up anyway.”

“Right,” Harry says, and Louis can hear the contained laughter in his voice. “It is about one in the afternoon.”

“Hey,” Louis says. “I’m twenty years old. Do you really expect anything different from me?”

“Not really, no.”

Smiling, Louis carefully unravels himself from his covers and dumps them back onto his mattress, moving to the other side of the room to dig around in his drawers for some clothes.

“So what was the reason to call and wake me up at this ungodly hour in the morning, Styles?”

That draws a snort out of Harry. “I was wondering if you’d like to come out to lunch with me? Today, or tomorrow, if it’s too late now.”

Louis accidentally slams the top of the chest down on his fingers. He curses, retracting them immediately, shouting obscenities loud enough that he probably just blasted out Harry’s ear drums.

“Louis? You okay?”

“Fuck, yeah, I – sorry. I’m an idiot is all, can’t even get dressed without hurting myself. You were saying about lunch?” He shakes out his hand, then brings it close to inspect the damage, wincing at the dark purple bruise that is already starting to form in a straight line along his fingers.

“Lunch, right. I figured if we’re gonna be working together we should get to know each other, yeah? I don’t have any afternoon classes today and none until five tomorrow, so if you want to go out whenever works for me.”

“I’d love to have lunch, sure.” Trapping his phone between his cheek and shoulder, Louis hops around the room on one foot, trying to pull his other leg through the pant leg of his jeans. “Today is good. What time?”

“Is two thirty good?”

“Perfect.”

“Okay. I know of a nice little library slash café a few miles away. I’ll text you the address and name and we can meet there?”

“Sounds great Harry. See you later.”

“Okay, see you.”

Louis waits until the other line goes dead before pressing the button to hang up. He rests his head against the cool wall, taking deep breaths and trying not to acknowledge the pounding in his chest.

If someone were to tell him a week ago he would finally get the nerve to even talk to Harry Styles, who he has had an embarrassing crush on since the beginning of the school year, he would have deemed them crazy. Now Harry Styles is asking him to go out to eat, even if it is just because Louis agreed to help him with some schoolwork.

Louis wonders if he ever really woke up yesterday morning.

+++

“Where are you?”

“I’m here. Where are you?”

“I don’t see you!” Louis gets up on his tiptoes and turns in a circle, holding his phone up to his ear. “I came to the right place I think. The Compass?”

“Yeah. What do you see?”

“Books?” Louis says. “A lot of books.”

Harry laughs, startling Louis. “What?” Louis demands. He twirls in another circle, wondering if Harry finally sees him and caught sight of his ridiculous posture but, no, he still can’t see him, only a ridiculous amount of book shelves stacked full with novels and magazines and a bored-looking girl painting her nails at the counter.

“Hold on one minute. I’ll come find you.”

The line goes dead and Louis hangs up, shoving it into the pocket of his jacket. A hand falls on his shoulder not thirty seconds later and, jumping, Louis turns to see who it is. Harry is smiling at him, eyes crinkled up in an amused expression.

“You know when I said we were meeting for lunch, I thought you would be smart enough to realize I wanted you to come to the café and not the library.” Harry raises his eyebrows, turning to lead Louis through the door into the café.

“Oh. That makes sense.” Taking a seat at the table opposite from Harry, Louis tries to ignore the burning in his cheeks and focus instead on inspecting his surroundings. Well, he is an idiot. The highest level of idiots possible. If there was a club for idiots, he would have to battle Zayn for the presidency. He takes a deep breath and tries to calm himself down. Lunch will be at least thirty minutes long, Louis still has time to redeem himself. Maybe walking away after their date (not date, but, you know, lunch date) Harry will think Louis is only a little bit crazy.

“I’ve never been here, I don’t think. It’s nice.”

“Yeah. I come here a lot to catch up on writing papers. I’ve managed to charm some of the waitresses into knocking the cost off some of my orders.”

He smiles, waving to someone over Louis’ shoulder. Louis is thankful Harry’s attention turns to them instead of Louis, because he was scrambling for a response and would rather not make even more of a fool of himself on their first time hanging out. “Nick! Alright?”

A tall man drops into the empty seat beside Louis, making himself right at home, and Louis should not find that rude, but listen, lunch is set to a limited time frame and he wants every minute of that between Harry and himself. Bit possessive maybe, but Louis always has been.

“Alright Harry, you?” When Harry answers, he turns his attention to Louis and smirks. “Who’s this pretty boy you’ve got? Not exactly your type, is he?”

“His name is Louis and he’s helping me with my final project. He’s a film major.” Harry’s tone, although Louis wouldn’t be the one to say for sure, seems curt and the words fall flat in his mouth.

Nick frowns. “Oh. Nice meeting you Louis.” Louis shakes his hand, resisting the sour expression that is trying to contort his face. He knows he is not exactly the most masculine man ever, but people making jokes about his appearance rubs him the wrong way. Even Zayn knows not to cross the line between teasing and hitting a sensitive spot.

“Nice to meet you too, Nick, is it?”

“Nick Grimshaw.”

“Right.”

For a few awkward seconds they stare at each other, not sensually, just fumbling for something to say or do, before Nick turns back to Harry and claps him on the back. “Well I need to get going, but nice seeing you Harry. You coming to the party on Friday?”

“Yeah. See you later.”

Louis waits until Nick is back out the door before he looks at Harry and raises his eyebrows, making Harry snort with laughter. “Wonderful guy.”

“Nick is a bit…much. Insensitive sometimes. You get used to it.”

“He didn’t seem too fond of my appearance.”

“He’s an idiot. He didn’t mean anything bad anything bad by it, he just wanted to tease me.”

Before Louis can ask why he would be teasing Harry by saying something about Louis, a waitress approaches their table and introduces herself. Harry orders a sandwich for himself, and since Louis didn’t get a chance to take a look at the menu, orders the same thing.

Sipping on his glass of water, Louis watches as the woman walks away, trying not to let his eyes stay on Harry for too long.

“So, Louis.”

Louis looks at him. “Harold.”

Harry’s lips quirk at the nickname, which isn’t exactly a nickname, but you get the point. “Tell me about yourself.”

Louis sets his glass down on the table and stirs the ice cubes around with the straw, not really sure what to do with his hands. He hates this part of every friendship, this awkward part where you both are unsure how exactly comfortable you are with each other, and are stuck between making small talk and actually getting to know each other. “What about me do you want to know?”

“Anything. Everything. Whatever you want to tell me.” Harry takes a sip of his own drink. “Where did you grow up?”

“Doncaster.”

“No way, really? I lived less than an hour away from there. Holmes Chapel.”

“Never heard of it,” Louis says apologetically.

“Most people haven’t. It’s small. There weren’t many children around there, just me and my sister and a few others. My class only had about seventy kids in it.”

“I have a sister too. Five, actually,” he laughs. “And a brother, but he’s only a few months old.”

“Five!” Harry exclaims. “That’s a big house. Are you the oldest?”

“Yeah. It’s nice sometimes, cause I can boss them around and stuff, but I also was always so pressured to do well and set a good example. They’re great though, I love them.”

“I’m the youngest, so I was the baby. My mum still sometimes forgets I’m not ten years old anymore.”

“Tell me about it,” Louis huffs. “When I went off to uni my mum had a breakdown at the train station and called me three hours later telling me how much she missed me already. I’m not really sure how she developed empty nest syndrome when there are six other kids in the house, but my mum has always managed to do the impossible.”

“That’s sweet. She seems like a nice lady.”

“She is,” Louis says without hesitation. “She’s amazing. My biological dad left us when I was a week old and she somehow balanced schoolwork, raising me, and working two job. I don’t know how she did it.” The words are out of his mouth before he can help himself. He frowns after he is done speaking, taking a drink just to give his mouth something to do. Zayn is his best friend, they grew up together, and it took Louis about three years to tell him the things he just told Harry within one of their few conversations. It should make him feel anxious, maybe, that a virtual stranger already knows such an integral part of Louis’ life, or that Louis trusts him so much without hardly knowing him, but it doesn’t. Harry has a kind face, one that softens in the right moments, one that contorts into an endearingly ugly face when he laughs. It’s so hard not to trust that face wholeheartedly.

“I’m sorry. My parents got divorced too when I was seven. My dad is still in my life though. It just didn’t work out, I guess.”

“Sometimes love doesn’t work out,” Louis agrees, and wow, why are they talking about this again? Not that he minds, it’s just that it is hard to believe they only just met seeing how open they are being with each other.

“I guess not. She found someone else, though. He’s great and I’ve never seen her happier. Maybe sometimes you have to lose something in order to gain something.”

The waitress interrupts their conversation then, balancing their dishes on her arms along with the cup of coffee that Harry had ordered. “Enjoy your meal,” she says before walking away again. Louis is glad she chose that moment to walk up; their conversation was getting a bit too close for comfort, even with Harry’s trustable face and everything.

Louis bites into his sandwich, making a show out of making delighted noises and rubbing his stomach, giving a thumbs up to Harry, who rolls his eyes at Louis’ exaggeration. “You have magnificent taste in sandwiches, Harry.”

“What a wonderful compliment. I appreciate that.”

“You better. Compliments from me are rare, I only give them if I truly mean it. And I can say that you, Harry, have great taste in sandwiches.”

The rest of their lunch is spent on a much less serious note. They talk about their classes and what they would like to do with their degrees, then they start rattling off names of their friends to see if they have any mutual friends. The only one they have in common is Niall, who Harry seems to be good friends with, but Louis only ever talks to because they are in the same film class.

“Niall is throwing a party this Friday. Did he invite you?” Harry asks.

“He might of mentioned it, yeah.”

“Are you going?”

“Parties aren’t really my thing,” Louis shrugs.

“You should come! I’ll be there.”

“I won’t know anyone besides you.”

“You would know Niall.”

Louis rolls his eyes at him. “I’d feel out of place. You all are so popular and hardly anybody knows who I am.”

“That’s why you have to get out and meet new people!” Harry exclaims. “C’mon, you should go. Please?”

Louis frowns down at his hands, which are clasped in lap, his palms sweating nervously. Parties really are not his scene. He hasn’t been to one since about six months ago, and only then because Zayn and his group of friends dragged Louis along. He could say no. He could say he has school work to catch up on, or that his nonexistent girlfriend planned a date that night, or he is going home to visit his family. Harry would accept the excuse without a blink of an eye. But Harry wants him there, and Louis would never pass up the opportunity to spend time with Harry, even as drunk as he may be at that party.

“Fine. I’ll go.”

+++

“We’re talking about the same Harry here? Harry Styles? The boy with luscious curly brown hair and angelic lips who sits exactly two seats in front of and one seat to the left of you in English class?”

Pulling his legs up so he can bury his face between his knees, Louis groans as Zayn quotes him. He didn’t really say all that, did he? If he did, he was extremely wasted and even more extremely sexually frustrated.

“Yes, that Harry.”

“He invited you to a party?”

“He didn’t exactly invite me. I was already invited, he just asked if I was going.”

“But you weren’t going to go if he hadn’t asked you.”

Louis pointedly ignores that statement.

Zayn snorts and rolls back onto his bed, pecking at the keyboard on his laptop. “Just don’t come back here when you’re looking for a room.  I need my beauty sleep and would rather not be interrupted by a pair of hormonal teenagers.”

“One, you’re a year younger than me and I’m not even a teenager, so don’t start with that. Two, he’s straight. He isn’t and will never be interested in me. Even if there was some tension there, I wouldn’t do anything about it. I’m just helping him out with something.”

“Helping him out with something?” Zayn cries indignantly, looking away from his laptop to stare disbelievingly a Louis. “You’re shooting a music video for him and you barely even know him. You wouldn’t even model for me for my art project and I’ve known you since we were seven!”

“Oh fuck off. You know it’s not the same.”

“And how exactly is it different?”

Louis draws a blank at that. It’s not different is the thing. They had both asked huge favors of Louis, and Louis had been comfortable enough with Zayn to turn him down, but with Harry it had been different. Not that he was uncomfortable with Harry, it’s just that when the pretty boy from your English class that you have been pining after all year finally talks to you, you go along with whatever the excuse is to talk to him.

“Go to sleep, Zayn.”

+++

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday drag on in a way that transforms a measly seventy eight hours into what seems like three whole weeks.

Maybe a part of that is that he didn’t have English class those days, therefore not having an reason to talk to Harry besides sending him a text (and that would be weird, he decided, after half an hour of typing out about a hundred drafts of texts to send him then deleting them all). It’s melodramatic, he knows. He only just starting talking to Harry and has no reason to miss him so much, he is painfully aware of that as well. It still didn’t stop the sinking feeling in his gut when he woke up on Monday and morning and realized he would not be seeing Harry, and it certainly did not force away that same feeling over the next three days.

Finally, though, Thursday morning rolls around, and when Louis finds himself being a bit more chipper than usual, he attributes it to the fact that the school cafeteria is serving blueberry pancakes for breakfast.

He forces himself to walk at a normal pace to English class, telling himself he is not that far gone (yet) that he has to sprint across campus just for a few extra minutes of talking to Harry. Still, when he enters the classroom to find Harry already there and waving at him with a smile on his face, Louis can’t help but to smile back and sit down in the seat next to him.

“Is this seat taken?”

“It is now.”

“Fair enough,” Louis says, trying and probably failing to mask the smug look on his face when another girl enters the room and stops in her tracks when she sees Louis sitting in her usual seat. Pulling out his notebook, he flips it open to a blank page, which is not too hard to find since he has only ever taken about three notes in this class, and pulls out a pen to write with.

Although at the beginning of class he told himself he would actually try today, about fifteen minutes into their hour long lecture, Louis finds himself having to physically hold his eyelids open and resorting to doodle very poorly drawn attempts of the Power Rangers on his notebook. Every once in a while he will sneak a glance to his side to look at Harry, who always looks extremely concentrated with his eyebrows drawn in and bottom lip snagged between his teeth, which makes his heart flutter in his chest in a way that it really shouldn’t.

Ms. Brown dismisses them after what seems like an eternity; at least she must, Louis didn’t hear her, because students start standing up and shuffling out of the room. He stares down at his notebook, which has not one word written on it, and almost winces when he glances over to see that Harry has got a page and a half filled.

Harry, too, seems to notice, because as he is putting his own notebook away, he glances over and sees Louis starting helplessly down at his doodle-ridden paper.

“I’d be happy to help you, you know. You’re doing such a big favor for me. Giving you my English notes would be no problem.”

“Thanks. I just – this class bores the hell out of me. How do you do it?” He scoops his bag up and throws it over his shoulder, following Harry out the door and towards the direction of the dorm rooms, even though he has another class in about fifteen minutes in the opposite direction.

“I don’t know. I just love how much she loves the English language. I always have too. Not that you would know, since I don’t exactly speak eloquently, but I’ve always loved writing and poetry.”

“Please,” Louis huffs. “’Language is a misunderstood art of humanity,’” he quotes with an eye roll that hurts his eyes they roll so far back into his head. “Do you think she gets off from reading our essays? Maybe her husband reads her Oscar Wilde in the bedroom.”

Throwing his head back, Harry slaps a hand over his mouth to stifle the wild laugh that tore itself from his mouth. “Louis!” he says, the word muffled by his hand.

Whatever laugh had been growing in Louis’ own chest dies instantly, his eyes zeroing in on the exposed column of Harry’s throat. He tears his eyes away only because the thought of Harry glancing over to find his completely mesmerized by him laughing is unbearable and cringe worthy.

“It’s true,” he says with a shrug.

“Maybe, but I’d prefer not to think about my fifty year old English professor’s sex life.” Louis gives him another shrug and Harry, grinning, responds by rolling his eyes. “This is my room. Have you got another class?”

 

Louis had barely even noticed that they were inside the dorm building now, let alone had walked up a flight of stairs and down a hallway. He followed Harry all the way to his room. Is that weird? That’s weird. Harry probably thinks he is a stalker now.

 

He stands a few feet away while Harry digs around in the pockets of his jeans for the key. “Unfortunately.” Pulling out his phone to check the time, he curses himself for walking with Harry and not going straight to class. The earliest he can get there now is about five minutes late. “I should get going. See you later.”

 

“Tomorrow, right? Are you still coming to the party?”

 

“Sure.”

 

“Okay.” Harry smiles. “See you then. I’ll text you and we can work out a time to get started on the video. And if you want I can bring my English notes.” His eyes crinkle mischievously with the last line, making Louis stick out his tongue.

 

“Text me, then. See you.”

 

“Bye.”

 

As soon as Harry closes the door behind him, Louis turns and makes his way back out of the building and towards the film department. Needless to say, he does not look forward to his next class which is absent of Harry nearly as much.

 

+++

 

For twenty years Louis had managed to keep himself busy. Surely that skill should not have vanished at the blink of an eye, but now that he has the party on Friday night to look forward to, Louis can barely sit still, spends most of his classes twiddling his thumbs and checking the clock on his phone.

 

It’s sad maybe that he is looking forward to something so much, but only half of that energy is excitement, the other half being anxiousness. Not anxiousness anxiousness, but Louis isn’t stupid. He knows that Harry is quite popular, as popular as you can be at university, and that most of his friends are just as well known as him. Harry doesn’t seem like the type to hang out with assholes, but Louis is not exactly masculine and there’s some lingering contempt there that makes him anxious to be hanging around straight teenage boys, let alone drunk straight teenage boys, who love to use people like Louis as their verbal punching bags.

 

When Zayn notices his silence that night when they are hanging out in the dorm room after classes, Louis voices his concerns and Zayn almost yells at him.

 

“Louis, Harry’s not an asshole. I’ve seen him around before with non-straight couples, and you said he is friends with Nick Grimshaw right?” Louis nods. “Nick Grimshaw is gay, so. I doubt Harry has a problem with it.”

 

Louis picks at a loose thread on his jumper and shrugs half-heartedly. “I know. I’m just being stupid.”

 

“Lou,” Zayn says, softer this time. He pauses his laptop from whatever sitcom was playing and sets it down on the nightstand and stands up, moving over to lay down next to Louis on his bed. “If you’re really worried about it don’t go. I know you like Harry but feeling safe comes first. What about his friends makes you want to not hang out with them?”

 

“I hardly even know them so I can’t say, but,” Louis sighs while scooting over to make more room for Zayn. “it’s not even that they make me feel bad about myself, it’s just. It’s stupid. I’m being stupid. Go watch your show.”

 

Louis goes to push Zayn away but Zayn wraps his arms around him and clings on like a baby koala. “Talk to me Louis. I won’t make fun of you. Pinkie promise.” Releasing one arm from around Louis to hold out his hand, Zayn extends his pinkie and Louis wraps his own pinkie around it, rolling his eyes at the gesture. “There. You can’t break a pinkie promise. Now speak.”

 

“You’re awful,” Louis huffs. “I guess…just, all of Harry’s friends will be there and you know I turn into a literal pixie when I’m drunk and I’m scared I’m going to make a fool of myself and they’ll all hate me and Harry will never want to talk to me again.”

 

“Oh, Lou.” Zayn squeezes Louis even tighter in his arms and buries his face in Louis’s shoulder. When he speaks, his voice is slightly muffled by the fabric of Louis’ shirt. “It’s not stupid. But you do know, just because Harry is ‘popular’ doesn’t mean he’ll dislike you because you’re not. He did invite you there, right? He wouldn’t have asked you to go if he didn’t want you there.”

 

“Yeah,” Louis sighs. “You should come with me. I’ll hardly know anyone there.”

 

“They won’t mind that I wasn’t invited?”

 

“I doubt they’ll notice one extra person.”

 

“Alright,” Zayn says, smiling.

 

So when Friday night rolls around, Louis comes back to the room to find Zayn waiting for him, already dressed in his tightest jeans and boots and leather jacket. Louis rolls his eyes at him but doesn’t comment, knowing very well that Zayn will go off on some lecture about how fashion is a form of expression and if Louis doesn’t like it he can find another roommate and best friend.

 

He spends a good amount of time choosing his own outfit, maybe a bit more time than is warranted for a house party, but well, Zayn is not exactly lying when he says fashion is important, and Louis wants to look good. He finally settles on a simple black shirt and black jeans.

 

“Good?” he asks and gives Zayn a little twirl.

 

“Perfect.”

 

The walk through the dorm building is quiet except for the odd tinny sound of a TV in a few of the rooms. As it is Friday, most of the students are probably at a variety of parties all around campus, but Louis hopes that not all of them are coming to the same party he is. Louis is odd like that – he can never be just by himself, has always got to have someone’s attention, but he keeps that someone limited to a close circle of friends that he has known for a long time. A huge group of people that he has never met before makes Louis’ knees go shaky. It’s stupid, he knows, and uni students aren’t like the kids from high school, but it doesn’t stop that feeling of dread that he is going to make a fool out of himself.

 

As only a best friend could, Zayn senses how Louis is feeling and steps closer so that as they walk their shoulders are bumping. When they round the last corner and walk up to the red brick house that is already pumping out music onto the street, Louis grabs onto Zayn’s hand and tightly interweaves their fingers.

 

Zayn gives him a reassuring smile as he raises a hand to knock on the door. It opens almost instantly. Harry stands behind it, a smile forming on his lips once he sees Louis.

 

“Lou! You came!”

 

Louis’ heart jumps at the nickname and he extends his hand that isn’t already occupied with holding Zayn’s out to Harry to shake. Harry takes it, his eyes flickering down to where Zayn and Louis’ hands are joined as he shakes it, his smile faltering.

 

“Uh, come in. You haven’t got coats so…” Harry glances around. “I’ll just – do you want me to introduce you to my friends?”

 

“Alright,” Louis says over the music.

 

The party hasn’t really kicked into full gear yet and judging by the vacancy of the place (not that it is vacant, but for a Harry Styles party it is) most of the people have not yet arrived. Louis follows Harry around the house as he introduces him to a slew of people that blend together in his head and he would surely not recognize if they talked to him later in the night. Nick Grimshaw is one of the only people he has met before, although he does not seem to recognize Louis, shaking Louis’ hand before attaching himself to Harry’s side and following them around for the next five minutes until he gets bored and wanders away again.

 

About fifteen minutes after Louis and Zayn had arrived, a huge group of people funnels through the front door, and Harry gets sucked into the crowd, leaving the two boys to their own devices. Someone turns the music up a few million decibels, so when Louis tries to speak to Zayn, he has to put his mouth right up to his ear and shout just for himself to be heard.

 

“Harry said they were serving drinks in the kitchen.”

 

Zayn nods, understanding, and tugs Louis off in the direction of the kitchen, their hands still attached so that they won’t get separated from the huge crowd of people that has gathered in the house.

 

Someone had replaced all the light bulbs in the house with black bulbs as a poor attempt for atmosphere, so Louis has to squint to make out that it is Niall who has the fridge door wide open and is handing out beers to passer-bys. He barely acknowledges Louis, just slaps his shoulder and yells that he was glad he could make it, then shoves two beers in his hand and moves on to the next person.

 

Beer in one hand, Zayn’s hand in the other, Louis wanders out of the kitchen, maneuvering through countless bodies and somehow managing not to spill his drink everywhere, into the living room. All the furniture has been pushed against the wall to make room for dancing in the center of the room. Throwing his inhibitions to the wind, Louis decides to join the mass of people who has gathered there and drags Zayn into the crowd, turning around to face him once he finds them an empty space to stand.

 

“Dance with me, Zayn,” he says.

 

“Not gonna ask Harry to?”

 

In response Louis gives him a grin, tips back his bottle, and finishes the rest of it in one go. He hands it off to someone next to him, he doesn’t see who, and Zayn hands his own half-finished beer away, snatching two shots from someone else who is wandering around with a tray full of them. He hands one to Louis and counts them down from five. On two, Louis lifts the glass to his lips. On one, he tilts it back and chugs it. It burns on the way down, but it’s a good kind of burn, one that wakes him up from the inside out and sends an energized buzz pulsing throughout his entire body.

 

With just a beer and a shot in him, Louis is much too sober for his own liking, but a song Zayn likes has started to play over the speakers and Zayn starts dancing along to it, so Louis makes a promise to himself to find another round of shots after this song and steps up next to Zayn, dancing with him. Every hesitation that he had about coming is gone now, lost in the alcohol and the music and the sweaty bodies around him. Louis lets himself free and swings his body around as gracefully or ungracefully as he likes, gyrating his hips in figure eights and throwing his head back to shout along with the lyrics. No one gives him a second glance, all too caught up in their own partners to look at him for more than a second.

 

When the song ends Louis steps away from Zayn and weaves back out into the kitchen. He assumed Zayn would follow him, but when he glances back he is attached to some other man’s side, arms around his neck. Louis shrugs and continues on his way.

 

The kitchen is a much less wild scene than the living room. Only a few people stand inside, two of which whom Louis actually knows. He waves at Harry and walks over to him with a smile on his face.

 

“Hey,” Harry says. “Having fun?”

 

“Loads,” Louis answers. He cranes his head to see around Harry and leans in, whispering, “Where are the drinks?”

 

Harry throws his head back in a laugh. “What do you want?”

 

“Alcohol.”

 

Rolling his eyes, Harry hands him over a cold beer. As soon as Louis has got his hands on it, he takes a long drink and makes a big show out of sighing contently. He leans against the counter that Harry is sat on before jumping up on it completely to sit next to the taller man.

 

A few minutes later someone comes in a announces a group of people is starting up a game in the dining room, and after a glance to Harry to see that he is starting to get up to join, Louis jumps off the counter and heads into the other room.

 

A group of about fifteen people, two of them being Niall and Zayn, is sitting on the floor in a circle. When they see Harry and Louis coming, they scoot apart to make room for them. Louis takes a seat next to Niall. He leans in and whispers, “Looks like you’ll be kissing me then, you lucky duck.”

 

Niall shoves his shoulder good-naturedly and rolls his eyes. “All the girls will be so jealous.”

 

“You betcha.”

 

One of the men sitting, a brown-haired lad, pulls his phone out and asks, “Ready?”

 

“Wait,” Harry says. “What are we playing?”

 

“Dunno what it’s called. But we play a song and if they say a certain word, we agreed on baby, then we all take turns kissing the person to our left.”

 

“Okay,” Harry says, smirking, as he turns to see who is sitting next to him, which happens to be a curly-haired girl and Nick stupid Grimshaw. Louis gives Zayn a look, cursing himself for not sitting next to Harry. Even if the kiss didn’t mean anything, he would happily kiss Harry.

 

“Everyone ready now?” Everyone mumbles their consent to start so he presses shuffle. The first song that starts playing is something by Bruno Mars that Louis has never heard before. They are all silent, sitting with smirks on their face as they lean in to listen to for the word.

 

“Give me your attention, baby,” he sings. Everyone bursts out in laughter, Louis included, upon hearing the word. The man, Greg someone called him, pauses the music and turns to his left. “I guess I’ll go first. C’mon Sophie, pucker up.”

 

The girl to his left rolls her eyes and pretends to gag before leaning in and pressing their lips together, going in with her mouth already wide open. Louis cringes at the wet noise it makes when their lips connect. She bites down on Greg’s bottom lip, bringing her hands up to rest on his cheeks and pulls away from his lips, planting one last chaste kiss to his cheek that prints a bright red lipstick stain there, then falls back down into her seat, grinning and biting down on a laugh.

 

“Alright,” Greg says, sounding impressively only vaguely dazed. “Next song.”

 

It goes on like that for  another four rounds before it gets to Louis and Niall. Beyonce is the one that initiates the kiss this time. As soon as the word is out, Niall dives at Louis, tackling him onto his back, practically ravishing Louis on the dining room floor. For a straight man, he has no qualms about making out with a guy, and if it weren’t for Louis pushing him off of him, he probably would have choked to death from having Niall’s tongue down his throat.

 

With an enthusiastic perkiness, Niall jumps back into the circle while Louis tries to recover himself. He finally pulls himself back into the group when another couple of girls are kissing, finding Harry’s eyes on him. He gives Harry a hesitant smile, heart leaping into his throat.

 

What if Harry didn’t like that? Zayn said that he had friends who are not straight, but what if he is one of those people who says he doesn’t have a problem with it but hates actually seeing affection? If that is the case, then certainly he was not too pleased about Niall’s display of affection, however fake that may have been.

 

Louis swallows hard and forces himself to look away from Harry onto a spot on the floor.

 

His concerns are completely demolished when it comes to be Nick and Harry’s turn, and Harry kisses him as passionately as a couple would kiss each other. Louis tries not to be jealous, tells himself he has no right to be, but he can’t stop the twisting off his stomach, and he can’t force his eyes away until after Nick and Harry have separated, both laughing, thankfully not noticing Louis’ eyes locked on them. Louis feels Zayn’s eyes on him and glances over to Zayn watching him with a careful expression, eyebrows raised. Louis frowns at him, pointedly ignoring his gaze after that.

 

The game goes on for another few rounds, until everyone is all kissed out and someone else is handing out another round of shots in the kitchen again, and they all disperse in their separate ways. Niall catches Louis as he is walking away.

 

“You’re not a bad kisser, Tomlinson,” he says with a mischievous glint in his blue eyes.

 

“Not half bad yourself,” Louis laughs. “I’m always up for a friends with benefits kind of thing, you know my number.” Niall laughs back at him and turns to walk into the kitchen. With his body gone from blocking Louis’ view, Louis can see Harry standing in the same spot he was sitting in, his eyes glued on Louis. When he sees Louis looking at him, though, his eyes flit away and he goes for a nonchalant stance, arms crossed and hip popped out. Louis goes to walk over to him, but Zayn intercepts him on the way over, dragging him back into the living room to dance.

He spends the next who knows how many hours in that same room, sometimes dancing, sometimes flirting harmlessly with girls, sometimes pouring shot after shot of vodka down his throat. Louis thinks he might have even joined a group of girls doing shots of a man's abs, but Zayn pulls him away from the crowd to the edge of the room before he can.

 

“Hey Lou, I’m gonna head home, alright?

 

“Okay. Give me a minute and I’ll come with you.” Louis steps around Zayn and walks over to Harry, where he spotted him standing in the doorway to the kitchen a few minutes ago. “Hey Harry.”

 

Harry looks down at him, lips slightly parted, and runs a hand through his hair in a nervous habit. “Louis.”

 

“Fun party,” he grins. “I’ve got to head out now. It was great, though. I’m glad I came.”

 

“Okay. I’m glad you came too.”

 

Louis extends a hand for Harry to shake, but he wraps his arms about Louis, pulling him into a tight embrace. Hesitating only a moment, Louis wraps his own arms around him, trying to hide his smile in Harry’s shoulder. He cannot let Zayn see him grinning like an idiot because Harry hugged him. He would tease Louis about it till the grave.

 

Louis is the first to pull away. Harry drops his arms after he takes a step back, a smile curving his lips. Louis has to force himself not to stare.

 

“It was great. Give me a text and we can meet up to get started on your project, yeah?”

 

“Sure.”

 

Louis turns and links his hand again with Zayn’s, turning his head when they are at the door to give another wave to Harry.

 

“Have fun, Lou?” Zayn asks, a smug look on his face that Louis wants to smack right off.

 

“So much,” Louis answers dryly.

 

+++

 

The next morning, Louis wakes with the most awful hangover ever known to man.

 

He had been fighting off consciousness for about half an hour, but was finally jerked into reality when someone slammed a door in the hallway, initiating the pounding in Louis’ head that did not go away until he swallowed a handful of painkillers.

 

It takes another half an hour for the medicine to kick in enough that Louis can drag himself out of bed to crawl over to Zayn’s bed and push weakly on the boy’s shoulder until he wakes up.

 

“What are you waking me up for?” Zayn hisses through clenched teeth.

 

As a response, Louis dumps three painkillers and a bottle of water onto the pillow beside his face. After Zayn swallows the pills, Louis tells him he is going to try and take a shower without passing out, Zayn tells him to stop talking, and Louis stumbles out the door, his head pounding so loud he can’t tell if it is because someone is stomping their feet on the floor above him or if it is coming from inside his skull.

 

He manages to shower himself without blacking out or throwing up, though, so maybe this day will not be such an awful one after all. Zayn is still lying in the same position when Louis finishes, but after debating the pros and cons of getting dressed he concludes that Zayn has already seen him naked and won’t care, so Louis drops the towel onto the floor and flops down on his bed with a loud groan.

 

“I’m never drinking again,” Zayn moans, his voice muffled by the pillow that his face is pressed against.

 

“I’m never leaving our room again,” Louis agrees.

 

+++

 

His promise to never leave again is broken not three hours later when their Seinfield marathon is interrupted by Louis’ ringtone. Sluggishly he rolls off of Zayn’s bed and over to his own. When he sees Harry’s name as the contact calling though, he perks up and puts on his best “I swear I’m not dead inside” voice.

 

“Hey Harry!” Is that too energetic? Definitely too energetic. Nobody is that happy to speak to a friend, right?

 

“Hey Lou.” Louis decides that yes, he was definitely too energetic, because Harry sounds about three seconds from death.

 

“You alright?”

 

“Terribly, terribly hungover. Are you not?”

 

“My family is mostly Irish," he lies.

 

“Right, well, that explains it.” Harry laughs flatly. “I just remembered you needed the English notes.”

 

Louis raises his eyebrows. “Not right this second Harry, it can wait.”

 

“I know, I just – I woke up and thought of you and I remembered you needed them and didn’t want to forget.”

 

I thought of you.

 

Louis scolds his heart for jumping at those four words. It doesn’t mean anything. Friends think of other friends all the time. It would be quite sad if they didn’t, actually.

 

“That’s kind Harry, but you should get some rest.”

 

“Don’t have any medicine,” he sighs, and Louis can practically hear his pain over the phone.

 

“I’ll, uh-“ He glances over to Zayn, who is still curled up in a sea of blankets staring blankly at his laptop, his eyes glazed over. “I can bring you some. What’s your room number again?”

 

“Really?” Harry asks, his voice sounding considerably more cheerful. “Building A, room 233. I love you,” he adds.

 

“I am quite loveable,” Louis jokes. “I’ll be right over. Try not to die in the meantime.”

 

+++

The whole way there, Louis wonders what the hell he is doing. Had anyone else called him early in the morning (not that early, really, but) and whined about not being able to sleep because they didn’t have any painkillers to cure their hangover, Louis would have told them to fuck off and hung up. Harry is different, though. Everything is always different with Harry. For example, when Zayn smiles at Louis, his heart doesn’t leap into his throat and he doesn’t feel the urge to crowd against him and kiss him until they are both breathless with it.

 

Louis runs a hand across his forehead. Those are big thoughts for so early in the day.

 

He slows when he gets to 230, then stops completely in front of Harry’s door, taking a deep breath before raising his hand and knocking on the door.

 

Harry must fall off the bed or something, because after Louis knocks he hears a crash, Harry swearing, then, “I’ll be right there!”

 

A bleary-eyed Harry answers the door. In lieu of a greeting, Louis holds out his hand which is carrying the pills that are now sticky from his body warmth. Harry snatches them up and takes them dry, remembering to acknowledge Louis after he has swallowed them.

 

“G’morning.”

 

“Or not so good, huh?” Louis smiles.

 

Harry nods and backs into the room. “You’d think with all the partying I do my body would learn to be accustomed to it, but I feel fucking awful.” He stares at Louis through half-lidded eyelids. “Are you gonna come in or are you leaving me to deal with a hangover all by myself?”

 

“Oh,” Louis breathes. He clears his throat and smiles. “Sure. Do you want tea or anything first? I was going to swing by the cafeteria to grab myself something.”

 

“With a splash of milk,” Harry says cheekily, giving Louis a close-lipped smile that carves dimples a mile deep into his cheeks. Louis’ heart stutters and he backs away before he can do anything stupid like try and kiss him.

 

“You got it.”

 

Waiting in line for their tea down in the cafeteria behind a girl who also looks fatigued and hungover, Louis sends a panicky text to Zayn, his heart thumping so loudly in his chest that even though Louis knows nobody else can hear it, it’s still embarrassing to think that Harry can do that to him. Harry. A boy he barely knows. Jesus Christ.

 

zayn !!!

 

louis !!!

 

get an ambulance on speed dial ready i think im gonna need one

 

Dazedly, Louis shoves a five pound note into the barista’s hand and grabs the two cardboard cups, nearly burning himself on the scalding tea. Holding one cup in his hand and the other trapped between his elbow and bicep, Louis uses the other hand to unlock his phone, trying not to spill hot drink all over someone and land himself in a lawsuit for ten million dollars.

 

does this have anything to do with a certain curly headed lad

 

who else would i go into cardiac arrest over ?

 

shut up and make a move

 

Louis scowls and shoves his phone back into the pocket of his sweatshirt. Frowning down at it, Louis tries to rub away the most obvious stains, although he knows his attempt is futile, and wonders why he didn’t put on a better shirt before walking over to Harry’s. Last week’s pizza is still on it, as well as a huge stain on the chest from where he had spilled a jar of salsa. He looks like a mess, and Harry is not wearing clothes that are much better, but at least he looks decent in them. More than decent. Great, actually. He looks great in anything, to be completely honest.

 

Louis almost slams into the door when he turns into Harry’s room, too lost in his own thoughts to remember that he had closed the door behind him, and jumps back, cursing. He opens it and steps inside with a burning face to find Harry still lying on the bed with an amused expression on his face.

 

“Maybe you shouldn’t have walked all the way there, you seem quite disoriented.”

 

“Shove off,” Louis mutters, biting his cheeks in attempt to hide the smirk tugging on his lips.

 

“Have you at least gotten me tea?”

 

“With a splash of milk,” Louis nods.

 

“Perfect. You’re a savior, you know that?”

 

“So I’ve been told.”

 

Louis hands the cup over to Harry, telling him to be careful because it’s still hot, and Harry thanks him, scooting up on the bed to make room for Louis. He takes a seat next to him, as far over as he can get without making it too obvious. Harry notices, though, and frowns as he blows the steam off of his tea. Before he can say anything about it, Louis starts talking. “So what are you going to do all day? I assume you haven’t got classes.”

 

“No, I’m not that stupid to party before a day of classes, no matter how stupid I may seem.” Louis shrugs and takes a sip from his tea.

 

“You never know.”

 

“If I wasn’t concerned my head would explode, I would punch you for that.”

 

Louis gives him a cheeky grin.

 

“Anyway, I was just thinking I would hang out here. You can stay if you want. Niall is supposed to come around sometime, but who knows when he’ll ever drag his ass out of bed, and I would love some company until then.”

 

Louis sets his cup down on the stand beside Harry’s bed to pull out his phone, immediately going to open up his and Zayn’s messages and send him another warning to prep the ambulance. “Sounds great. I don’t have anything to do either.”

 

“Cool,” Harry says. He leans back to stretch, lifting his arms above his head. A strip of skin appears beneath where he shirt rides up. Louis refuses to look. He will not look, and. Yep, he’s looking. Even when Harry lets his arms back down, Louis’ eyes stayed locked on the spot where two inches of Harry’s stomach had been visible. He has never felt so pathetic.

 

In a hurry to distract Harry in case he saw him looking, Louis jumps up off the bed and paces around the small room, investigating the details. Harry’s eyes follow him as he moves from one side of the room to the other, touching little baubles on the dresser or examining the posters on the walls as he goes. He doesn’t know Harry well, but Harry lives alone in his room, so Louis feels like he is getting a little peak into Harry’s brain. He would have never guessed Harry would be into Disney films, but the little figurine of Lilo and Stitch next to his alarm clock tells a different story. Louis hesitates for a moment, wondering if Harry is uncomfortable with him shamelessly rummaging around his room, but then decides Harry would have said something if he was, and picks up the two figurines.

 

“You like this movie?”

 

“My sister bought them for me for my fifteenth birthday. I just keep them cause they remind me of home,” he explains, going for a nonchalant tone, but Louis can see the tips of his ears turning red from embarrassment and he thinks that there is probably more to the story than what he said.

 

“They’re cute. I like them.”

 

“Good. They would be offended if you didn’t.” Harry says it in such a serious tone that Louis has to laugh at that. He rolls his eyes and flops back down on the bed. “Want to watch a movie? I’ll even let you pick.”

 

Louis quirks an eyebrow. “I thought you had some English notes you were going to give me? That’s the only reason I came over.”

 

Harry leans over his bed and pulls his book bag out from under it to hand a stack of note sheets to Louis. “Quite frankly I’m offended, but I like you, so here.”

 

Louis takes them and smiles graciously. “I guess I’ll be heading out then.” He turns to head out the door, is halfway out of the room, before he drops the joke and comes back inside to take his seat again. “Okay, so,” he says, ignoring Harry having a laughing fit beside him. “What movies do you have?”

 

+++

 

They end up choosing to watch a horror movie although it is nowhere near Halloween, because Louis wanted to watch Grease and Harry wanted to watch Love, Actually. They argued over it for about five minutes before Harry pulled up a illegal movie website and the first thing that popped up was The Ring, so they agreed to watch that, but first Louis made Harry finish his tea because he did not want any third degree burns from Harry accidentally spilling it on him from jump scares.

 

When it finishes, Harry slams his laptop shut and shoves it under his bed. “I’m never watching anything with you ever again.”

 

“It wasn’t that scary,” Louis lies, resisting the urge to check and make sure that little girl is not currently crawling out of Harry’s computer to come and murder them.

 

“It was too!” Harry cries indignantly.

 

“The only reason it scares you is because you have never seen the true horrors of the world. For example: my bank account.”

 

That tears a laugh out of Harry, a loud one that must make his hungover head ache, but he doesn’t show any signs of discomfort, so Louis allows himself a small victorious smile.

 

“So,” he says once Harry has calmed down. He watches as Harry untangles himself from the blanket that he burrowed in during the movie and gathers up his and Louis’ trash. Somehow even moving five steps to throw it into the trash can turns into some graceful act of beauty when Harry does it, the muscles on his back tightening when he leans over, his long legs putting anyone else’s to shame. Louis wonders how he became so infatuated with Harry so quickly that even throwing something away has him speechless.

 

“So?” Harry says, turning to Louis with one eyebrow raised.

 

“Oh, right. So. I was gonna say that we still haven’t got to work on your project. We should probably do that soon, yeah? How long have you got to do it?”

 

“A while.” After checking the calendar on his phone, Harry says, “The first of June, so we’ve got tons of time. But you’re right, we should get started on it. Do you have a free day sometime this week?”

 

“I’ve got classes everyday but I only have a morning one of Tuesday. Does then work?”

 

“Sure. You can come over here, or I can stop by your place, and we can get started?”

 

Louis nods with a smile.

 

“Okay. And thank you again, Louis, I can’t express how grateful I am.”

 

“No problem Harry. I love filming and it’s to help a friend, so it’s a win-win situation.”

 

“Still, though,” Harry says. “I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t of seen your film at the festival. We have to thank your teacher for setting that up so you could do it.”

 

“Thank Zayn too,” Louis laughs. “He’s the one who forced me to do it.”

 

“Well, the next time I see him I’ll do just that.”

 

When Louis gets back to his room, Zayn is sitting on the floor typing something on his computer, but the second Louis closes the door behind him Zayn jumps on him like a rabid dog, completely disregarding the fact that both of them had terrible hangovers and were just starting to fully recover, and demands why the hell Louis “abandoned me to hang out with Harry. What about dicks before chicks, dude? I thought you loved me!”

 

“Okay,” Louis sighs exasperatedly. “First one all, Harry is not a chick and I’m pretty sure he has got a dick, so that makes no sense. Second of all, you’re the one who has been nagging me to make a move on him, so don’t start with the whining.”

 

Zayn follows Louis to his bed and drapes himself over Louis when he sits down, apparently just as deprived of his attention as he said he was. “Details, then. Don’t leave anything out. Did you make a move?”

 

“No Zayn, I did not make a move. I told you before, he’s straight and I don’t want a relationship with him like that anyway.” He ignores the knowing look Zayn gives him and hurries to keep speaking before he objects. “We’re going to start on his project on Tuesday. I’m actually pretty excited. Now that the festival is over I can finally film something without shitting myself about how bad it’s going to be.”

 

“Right,” Zayn huffs. “Now that it’s not your own grade that’s at risk of failure.”

 

Louis sticks his tongue out and shoves Zayn onto the floor. “Get back to work, you miscreant.”

 

“Don’t tell me what to do. I’ll tickle you.”

 

“You wouldn’t dare,” Louis gasps, curling into a ball to protect himself From Zayn, who has risen from the floor and is extending his arms towards Louis with a menacing grin on his face. His attempts to protect himself fail, though, as Zayn digs his fingers into Louis’ side, making him howl with laughter. “Get-“ another jab to the ribs has him screeching, thrashing around to get Zayn off. “off!” Zayn ignores his protests and keeps going, almost tearing up with the laughter himself, until Louis is not even laughing anymore, just silently making faces with tears streaming down his face while he hiccups. Finally, then, Zayn backs off and drops down onto his own bed.

 

“Have you learned the lesson who is the real master of this dorm room?” Zayn asks.

 

“I hate you,” Louis replies.

 

+++

 

Whoever says that libraries are a great place to work efficiently with zero distractions to hinder your learning are telling the biggest lie of the century.

 

He and Zayn are hanging out in back of the library pretending to study, books spread out open on the table in front of them. They are flicking a little piece of folded paper back and forth like a game of miniature football, if football had the ability to bore Louis so much that he is on the verge of passing out. Zayn flicks the paper a little to the left of Louis’ reach, Louis is too lazy to stretch out and reach for it and it flies past his shoulder, and as if on cue, his phone starts ringing at the highest level possible. Every head in the library turns to stare at him with an irritated look on their faces. He fumbles to dig out his phone from his bag before the librarian can start harassing him for “disturbing the hard-working students” and gives Zayn an apologetic look as he hurries out of the building.

 

“Hello? Mum?”

 

“Hi Louis. How are you?”

 

“Alright?  I was in the library doing work. Why are you calling?” He smacks himself as soon as the words are out of his mouth, knowing that he sounded like he did not want his mother to call, when it is the exact opposite, he has always been a mommy’s boy.

 

“Aren’t you happy to hear from your darling mother, Lou?”

 

“Of course I am,” he relents, huffing sarcastically, eliciting a sharp laugh from Jay.

 

“To answer your question, I’m calling because I’m making plans with your grandmother for Christmas and she wants to know when you are coming back home. If you’re coming back home.”

 

Louis winces at that. It wasn’t his fault really. Well, yes it was. Last year he was supposed to drive home Christmas Eve and spend that whole week at home with his family, but he went partying the night before at a surprise birthday bash with some friends that Zayn threw and got so smashed that he didn’t wake up until four in the afternoon the day following, too hungover to drive himself safely all the way to Doncaster, so he ended up showing up early Christmas morning with a box of donuts as an apology. “I am, promise. When are we having dinner with Grandma?”

 

“The same as every year, Louis.”

 

“Okay, then I’ll be home around lunch on my birthday.”

 

“Stick to that this time, Louis. Your sisters were disappointed last year.”

 

“I know,” Louis says. “I really am sorry. It won’t happen again.”

 

“Okay,” Jay says.

 

“Listen, Mum, I’d love to talk but I have to go. Can I call you back later tonight?”

 

“Anytime, just not after nine. Your sisters go to bed then and they have school tomorrow.”

 

“Okay. Love you,” he says. After Jay bids him farewell and tells him she loves him, Louis hangs up and walks back inside the library. The second he is inside he can feel the librarian’s eyes on him in a glare. Louis doesn’t meet her gaze, wanting to avoid a brawl in the middle of a library over a phone ringing.

 

One good thing seems to have come from the distraction though, because Zayn has pulled his History of Art book opened up and a page of notes in front of him, looking to be thoroughly actually reading it. He glances up when Louis sits back down, a smirk tugging on his lips. “Was that Harry?”

 

“No it was not Harry, it was my mother. I have a life that doesn’t revolve around him, you know.”

 

Zayn feigns shock and presses a hand to his chest. “Really? I would never have guessed with how much you talk about him.”

 

“You know, you make fun of me for having a petty little crush on him-“ At that Zayn’s mouth falls open in shock and he whisper-shouts “a petty crush?!” but Louis ignores him and goes on. “but I recall that one blonde kid from last year that you wrote a sonnet about and turned it in for a grade and ended up getting it published in a stupid magazine article.”

 

“Hey.” Zayn points an accusing finger at Louis. “You have no way to prove who I wrote that sonnet about. Besides, it’s not my fault I’m just so good at poetry that my professor sent it in to get published. It’s natural talent, something that you-“ He cranes his neck, pretending to scan over Louis’ body. “seem to be lacking.”

 

“I am not!” Louis exclaims. “I’ve got plenty of natural talent, just not that way. Ask any of my past boyfriends, I’m sure they’d be happy to tell you.”

 

At that Zayn cannot hold back his laugh. It is the last straw for the librarian, who seconds later stomps over to the table they are sitting at and tells them off. Louis’ body is shaking with the effort to suppress laughter through the whole ordeal, and the moment she is finally back at her desk he bursts out in laughter.

 

“Shhh. We don’t want to disturb the other students,” Zayn quotes.

 

“We’re awful people,” Louis whispers around his grin.

 

“Agreed.”

+++

 

Despite having gotten off on a bad start, Louis actually does get some work done at the library. He settles down after being told off, because no matter what persona he puts on he really does not like to be yelled at, and decides that if he cannot mess around, he may as well use the time to get some much-needed work done. When they finally walk out around dinner time, Louis has nearly completely finished revisions for an English paper that was due approximately two weeks ago, with the aid of Harry’s note, of course.

Following routine, without a word he and Zayn turn right immediately out of the building to head back to their dorm. The food in the cafeteria is not exactly gross, but some new law went into effect the year before they came that says they have to serve quote unquote healthy food, so Louis and Zayn choose instead to order takeout every single night. They will probably regret it by the time they graduate, both in the sense that they are slowly killing themselves and that it costs a ridiculous amount of money, but if they end up dying because of it, at least in that short amount of time they lived.

 

Halfway back, though, Louis’ phone buzzes with a message from Harry, and he has no choice but to break routine with Zayn.

 

Louis! You should come eat with me if you want, theyre serving pizza ;)

 

“Uh, Zayn?”

 

“Yes, Lewis?”

 

“Fancy having dinner in the cafeteria tonight?”

 

Louis flinches under the scandalized look Zayn throws him. “The cafeteria? What kind of boy do you take me for?”

 

“One that helps his best friend impress his stupid crush.”

 

“I see. So this about Harry.” The last line is a statement more than a question.

 

“Maybe.”

 

“And what exactly happened with ‘We’re just friends Zayn! I don’t want him that way!’?” Raising a skeptical brow, Zayn does not slow as he walks toward their building.

 

“You’re awful and I hate you.”

 

“You don’t.”

 

“Whatever. Are you coming or not?”

 

“You can, I’m not. I’m craving a nice box of Chinese takeout right about now.”

 

Louis’ stomach grumbles with that, but it does not take him long to weigh his options, and decides that he would take Harry and gross whole grain school pizza over Chinese takeout any day.

 

“Then I’ll see you later. Have a nice time being lonely,” he says cheekily, earning an irritated look from Zayn. Before the other man can retaliate he turns on his heels and heads in the opposite direction towards the cafeteria.

 

Having only eaten about two meals in the cafeteria during his first week here, Louis has absolutely zero clue how this works in university, if it is the same as grade school or totally different. Does everyone have assigned seats and if you break that assignment you get beaten up by that whole table, or does everyone actually socialize with different groups of people, or do people eat by themselves? More importantly, will Nick Grimshaw be there? Louis does not think he can stand the sight of him and Harry standing within ten feet of each other after that scene at the party Friday night.

 

His concerns are soothed when Louis spots Harry at a table in the center of the room, completely devoid of Nick, instead chatting animatedly to a pretty brown-haired girl. Louis approaches them at a slow pace. Is that Harry’s girlfriend, then? Maybe having Nick around would not be so bad after all.

 

Harry glances up when he feels Louis’ eyes on him and smiles brightly the second he sees him. He beckons Louis over and pulls his bag off the table to make room for Louis to sit down. “Hi.”

 

“Hi yourself,” Louis smiles.

 

“How are you?”

 

“Hungry.”

 

The girl next to Harry shoves a plate in his direction. Louis thanks her and tries not to inhale the pizza whole before he can even introduce himself. “I’m Louis,” he says, extending a hand towards the girl.

 

“I know,” she says as she shakes his head with a soft smile. “Eleanor.”

 

Louis blushes. He probably has a class with Eleanor, that’s how she knows who he is. Should he recognize her? Probably, but Louis is terrible with putting names to faces, so you can’t really blame him. “Sorry, have we got class together or something?”

 

Eleanor frowns with confusion. “No? I don’t think so at least.”

 

“Oh.” Louis frowns himself and takes a bite of his pizza so he doesn’t have to respond any more than that. Harry glances between them with a slight red tinge to his face.

 

“Eleanor was at the party.”

 

Louis hums around his bite. After he swallows, he says, “That makes sense. Did you have fun?”

 

“Hardly,” Eleanor snorts. “Harry wouldn’t stop talking about how good-“

 

“Of course she had fun,” Harry interjects. “Are you questioning my ability to throw a good party Louis?”

 

“Of course not,” Louis replies with raised brows.

 

Harry nods appreciatively. The small group lulls into a silence then, and Louis finds himself racking his brain to find something to say. He feels like a terrible human being for thinking this, but Louis wishes Eleanor would sense the tenseness in the air and make up some excuse to leave. Harry and he never have this awkward silence between them. That is the weird thing about Harry and Louis – from the first time they met to present day, never once have they had a conversation where Louis embarrassed himself and made him wish he could disappear. Besides the stray accidental stare when Harry catches Louis staring at him when he should not be, things are never awkward between them, and maybe that would seem weird to Louis, but he knows that it is just the start of a great friendship. Zayn and he were like that too when they first met, never a dull moment between them. It reminds Louis again that he cannot ruin things between he and Harry because of some temporary feelings. No way he is letting himself destroy a potentially great friendship because of something stupid like that.

Eleanor does seem to sense the tension but instead of leaving as Louis hoped, she starts firing question after question at him in attempt to start up a conversation. “So you’re a film major, huh?”

 

“Right. What are you studying?”

 

“English Literature,” she says.

 

“Oh. Fun.” His tone is comes out much more dry than initially intended, but luckily Eleanor takes it good-naturedly and laughs.

 

“Not really, not to most people. Harry never fails to let me know how weird I am for enjoying it.”

 

“At least you’ll most likely get a job for your major,” Louis points out. “I have absolutely zero clue what I’m going to do when I’m done here.”

 

Harry frowns, looking personally offended. “Don’t say that, Lou. If anyone deserves a spot in the film industry, it’s you.”

 

“You’re just saying that because you want me to get famous and mooch off my money,” Louis says seriously.

 

For a moment, Harry’s brows furrow and he beings to protest, but then he catches on to the joke, and smirks. “You caught me. How am I supposed to pay off all these university debts now?”

 

“Hmm, let’s see. Get a job?”

 

Harry shakes his head. “I’m a fragile boy Louis, don’t you know that? I can’t do work.”

 

“It’s true,” Eleanor says. She dodges Harry when he goes to shove her shoulder. “You know it is, Harry! Don’t lie.”

 

“Maybe just a bit,” Harry admits. He takes a huge bite out of his pizza, making his cheeks puff out like a chipmunk and Louis laugh at the funny sight. “What?” Harry asks, spraying bits of pizza everywhere. Eleanor gasps and jumps away, pulling her plate with her plate over to the other side of the table. He blushes and hurries to swallow the bite. “Sorry.”

 

Louis is laughing too hard to respond, but when he does gain some control over himself, he takes a bite out of his own pizza and puffs his cheeks out to mimic Harry, who flushes an even darker shade of red, and buries his face in his hands.

 

“You guys hate me.”

 

“Nah, Harry, we were just surprised that you’re in university and still don’t know how to feed yourself properly.”

 

“Hey,” he says, reemerging from behind his hands to point at the half eaten slice of pizza in front of him. “Table manners are forgotten when pizza this delicious is at stake.”

 

“Harry.” Louis slams his hands down on the table. “I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of it before, but you’re going to cream your pants if I take you to Pizza Hut.” Harry rolls his eyes and goes back to eating his pizza in silence, this time taking considerably smaller bites to ensure that he doesn’t cover Louis and Eleanor in half chewed bits of pizza again.

 

When they have all finished, Harry gathers the plates up to go dump off the trash into the garbage bin. Eleanor waits for him to return then announces she has an evening class to get to, so Harry and Louis are finally left alone. Harry grabs his book bag before following Louis out of the building. Louis stands hesitantly, debating which direction to head in. He hasn’t got anything to do for the rest of the night, but he is not sure if Harry wanted to hang out, but then Harry starts walking in the direction of the dorm rooms, so Louis follows him.

 

“We still on for tomorrow?” Harry asks with a sideways glance towards Louis. It takes Louis a moment to remember what he is talking about, wonders if he made some plans with him Friday night and has forgotten about them. He finally remembers, though, that the only reason he and Harry are actually talking now is because he agreed to help Harry with his project.

 

“Oh! Yeah, of course.”

 

“Okay.” Harry smiles. "I'll stop by after your class and we can get started.”

 

“Sure,” Louis says.

 

Silence falls over them for the rest of the short walk, but it is much different than when Eleanor was with them. It’s comfortable and it’s companionable and Louis would not mind sitting with Harry in silence for hours and hours, both lost in their own thoughts, happy enough to just be with each other without having to talk.

 

Except that is kind of weird, because Harry doesn’t think those things about Louis, and it is far too early in their friendship for Louis to be thinking those things, so Louis forces those thoughts away and finds himself very thankful that they are nearly at Harry’s building.

 

“I – uh, I can’t hang out tonight. Sorry. I have a paper due tomorrow that I need to finish.” Harry scratches the back of his neck, looking truly sorry for not being able to spend time with Louis, which makes Louis’ heart leap. Even if Harry doesn’t replicate Louis’ feelings, he still seems genuinely invested in their friendship, and well, that’s more than Louis could have ever hoped for.

 

“No worries,” Louis says. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

 

Harry hesitates only a second while nodding before he pulls Louis into a hug. Startled by the familiarity, Louis can only wrap his own arms around Harry and try to resist the urge to kiss him and push away the thought, I could get used to this. Harry is the first one to pull back, and when Louis notices the slight blush on his cheeks he dismisses it and blames it on the brisk autumn air. He turns, waving over his shoulder, then walks inside. Louis watches the door swing shut and tilts his head back to stare at the sky.

 

“I’m fucked.”

 

+++

As promised, Tuesday afternoon Harry shows up at Louis' door with a guitar in one hand and a laptop in the other. He is early, and Louis, perhaps the world's biggest procrastinator, who put off changing out of his pyjamas that he changed into after class, is wearing a Marvel t-shirt and has his hair pulled off his face with a black headband. He deflates when he hears the knock and doesn't even bother trying to fix his hair.

Harry's eyes go straight to the headband when the door opens.

"Don't make fun of it," Louis says, retreating back into the room and clearing a spot on the bedside table for Harry's computer.

"I wasn't going to make fun," Harry frowns. "I like it."

Unable to think of something witty to say back, Louis lets the subject drop and takes a seat on his bed. He pats the spot next to him for Harry to sit. Once he does, Louis crosses his legs Indian style and turns to face him. "How was your day?"

"Fine," Harry shrugs. "Yours?"

"Alright. Ready to get started on this?"

Harry nods. He shifts his weight, face tingeing red, as he reaches for the guitar. Louis smiles; in the arts himself, he knows that feeling of pre-performance nervousness all too well, even if your audience is just one other person.

"Don't be so nervous. I won't laugh, Haz."

Harry picks at the strings on the guitar, twisting the knobs on the end to tune it. Louis doesn't really think it needs tuned, from the sound of it, but assumes Harry is trying to stall the inevitable as long as possible.

"I know," he says. "I just - it's nerve-wracking. Can I just play the recording for you? There's no way a recording can mess up."

Louis nods, only a bit disappointed, watching Harry as he sets his guitar back down and picks up the laptop in its place. It takes a few minutes for Harry to pull up the song, and Louis watches his fingers stretch across the keyboard as he does. He may be developing an unhealthy obsession with them, but that topic is for later, not right now, when his trousers are much too tight to hide a semi.

"Ready?" Harry asks.

Louis looks up, tearing his eyes away from Harry's hands. "Ready."

Louis takes the earbuds Harry hands him and puts them in, and Harry presses play.

 

The first thing Louis hears is a piano, and a few seconds later Harry’s distinguishable voice. The second the first lyric is out of his mouth, Louis knows what this song is about, and his heart falls in his chest. He should have expected Harry is not the type to write an upbeat pop song, but he did not expect this, either.

 

Harry must be able to hear through the earbuds, because out of the corner of his eye Louis can see him mouthing along to the words silently. Louis doesn’t look at him, stares at the screen instead. Harry is talented, Louis knows that, but the lyrics truly astound him with their beauty, and Louis, although he has never been through a heartbreak himself besides the occasional teenage relationship ending, feels his heart aching with the words. Harry’s voice, too, is perfectly suited to this song, not too raspy, but enough so that it feels as if he just sat down and penned these lyrics and is now singing them merely hours after a heartbreak. Louis can almost see his tears with the music, the repeated “don’t let me, don’t let me” personifying his pain.

 

When the song is over, he pulls the earbuds out and presses them back into Harry’s hand, completely silent. Eyebrows raised, Harry looks at him for the first time since he pressed play. “Well?”

 

“Wow,” Louis breathes in response.

 

“Wow?” Harry asks. “What does that mean? Is it awful? Is it-“

 

“No. No, it’s – wow, Harry. It was beautiful. Don’t take offense to this, but I seriously underestimated your talent. I did not expect that.” He glances up to see Harry still staring at him, bottom lip snagged between his teeth as he chews on it in a nervous habit. “It’s amazing – you’re amazing. I don’t think I can do justice to this song.”

 

“Well don’t bail on me now. It’s too late to find someone else,” Harry says.

 

Louis laughs. “I won’t, but be aware that my video will not compare at all to your song.”

 

Harry shakes his head. “I don’t believe that. Your talent matches mine, if not overtakes it.” Louis blushes, but before he can protest Harry goes on. “So now that you’ve heard it are you able to visualize what we should do? I’m going to be really unhelpful here, but I have absolutely no clue what I want to do for the video. I don’t know if I want another actor or just me or whatever.”

 

The first thing that comes to Louis’ mind is that there is no way he is going to let an actor hang all over Harry and pretend to break his heart, even if it is fake. He cringes in shame, though, cursing himself for being so selfish and possessive, and tries to force away all bias to try and visualize what he can do with this song. “I think we should do something minimalistic, you know? We can bring in another actor for a few scenes if you want, but I feel like the song is too short to try and tell a story with it. I think we should have just you standing or sitting or something, like you’re looking back on the experience. That would speak louder volumes than trying to tell a broken love story in three minutes.”

 

Harry nods. “That makes sense. I agree.”

 

“Are you sure? I’m not the master of this, you can have opinions too.”

 

“No, yeah, I’m sure. You know better than I do, anyway. I’m totally clueless on anything having to do with a camera or making a film.”

 

“Okay,” Louis says with a slight frown.

 

“Can we start on it? Right now,” Harry says.

 

Louis glances down at the clock on his phone, then looks back up with a nod. “Sure. Mrs. Samuels gave me the key to her film room so I can use it whenever we need, cause I told her about this project, so we go head down there now if you want.”

 

Harry stands up and grabs his guitar and laptop. “Let’s go, then.”

 

When they arrive, the room is completely dark, and Louis can hear Harry’s breath as he fumbles around looking for the light switch. Finally he finds it and flicks it on and the room lights up with bright fluorescent lights. Harry squints against it, but Louis, accustomed to it, moves immediately over to the cameras and begins turning them on.

 

“We’re starting to film already? We’re not gonna, like, make a script or something?” Harry asks. He walks over and sets his guitar down on the ground, watching Louis.

 

“We can if you want, but I didn’t think we needed one. I honestly believe this video would turn out best if we just set you down in front of a camera and you sang. I would make the angles look good and switch them up occasionally, of course, but I don’t think we need to do anything more than that.” He flicks on one of the studio lights, bathing Harry is bright white light.

 

“Okay,” Harry says, still sounding uncertain. “So you just want me to sit down and play it?”

 

“Exactly,” Louis says.

 

Eyebrows furrowed slightly inwards, Harry squats down and opens the guitar case, pushing it out of the way behind the row of cameras once he takes it out. “Just sit down and play? On that stool right there?”

 

“Yeah,” Louis says, laughing slightly. “Sit down and play. The cameras are all ready, so when you’re ready just go.”

 

“There’s a piano bit at the beginning of the song, though.”

 

“We can edit it in. I doubt we’ll use any of these clips anyway, it’s just to get you used to being in front of a camera.”

 

Harry nods and takes a seat on the stool, setting the guitar on his lap and giving it a few strums before using it to mimic the piano and shakily singing the lyrics. He stops about thirty seconds in and looks up at Louis with wide eyes. “Sorry, I – Can I start again?”

 

“Of course.”

 

He takes a deep breath and starts again. This time around, he has more control over his voice and it only wobbles a bit at the start of the first chorus, but he gets it back under control by the next line. Louis, not wanting to make him nervous by just standing there and staring at him, walks around and pretends to check the cameras, although he knows they are all perfectly fine. By the second verse, Harry seems to have forgotten where he is and he belting out the lyrics with confidence, squeezing his eyes shut to concentrate. When the song is finished, he blinks his eyes back open, looking almost surprised to find himself in this room.

 

“Good?” he asks.

 

“You tell me,” Louis says. “Did you feel good?”

 

“I guess. It’s weird having a bunch of cameras in lights in my face, but I kind of forgot about them while I was singing.”

 

“You were great,” Louis reassures him with a bright smile. “Your voice is really incredible.”

 

“Thanks.” Harry points at the camera closest to him. “So all you’re going to do is set them there and film me?”

 

“No. That was just a practice round. Once we actually start filming I’ll rearrange them and move them around to get different angles and shots. It’ll work out in the end, trust me.”

 

Harry frowns, but nods along. “I trust you.”

 

“Good. Wanna go again?”

 

+++

 

Over the next few weeks, they really get started with the project, and Louis actually does his job like he promised. Every Sunday, the only day they both have the whole day off, they go down to the room and shoot a few times. Harry doesn’t understand why they need to shoot it so many times, and after Louis explaining to him how they need multiple shots and angles and whole run-throughs as backup just in case one turns out to be bad, using technical film lingo, he stops asking.

 

Sometimes Louis will stay a few extra hours to upload the footage to his computer and watch it over, trying to get a feel for what the video will be like and finding flaws that he needs to fix. When he does that, Harry always stays with him, and in that time they get to know each other. Like how Harry tried to play footie for his school but couldn’t play very well and eventually gave up in Year 7, and how he has a cat named Dusty which is what he misses most from home, and how he really does love English and reads Charles Bukowski for fun. (Louis makes fun of him for that one for days.)

 

Before Louis knows it, it is finals week and both of them are usually too tired to do anything but sit and talk or work on their assignments or study, so for a few weeks their progress slows, but Louis is still happy nonetheless that he gets to spend time with Harry.

 

“Are you going home for Christmas?” he asks, his legs propped up a few inches off the ground on the wall, lying back on the floor with his math book laying untouched on his stomach.

 

“’Course,” Harry says. “I’ve got to go back and see my mum and step-dad and sister. I’d miss them too much to wait until summer. Are you going home?”

 

“Yeah. I’d miss my sisters too much,” Louis agrees.

 

“So I guess we won’t see each other next Sunday,” Harry says, pushing his bottom lip out in a pout that makes Louis want to kiss it away.

 

“Guess not. You’ll have to call me.”

 

“Will do.”

 

Louis laughs around the feeling of dread that pools in his stomach. A whole week and a half without Harry, what a nightmare. “Promise you will. I’ll miss you.”

 

Harry glances up from his laptop, eyes soft. “I promise. I’ll miss you too.”

 

Louis smiles.  “I’ll hold you to that.”

+++

 

It was a mistake turning to close the door behind him, because the second he does, four pairs of arms tackle Louis to the ground and the bodies they are connected to jumps on top of him. Groaning from beneath the weight, Louis has no choice but to yell for his mother and hope for the best. She saves him a few minutes later when she appears at the doorway and scolds his sisters for attempting to suffocate Louis before he has even been home for five minutes. Reluctantly, the girls scramble off him and run off to the living room. Louis embraces his mother in a tight hug before following them, flinging his bag at the closest person, who happens to be Lottie, lounging on the sofa watching the twins roughhouse on the floor in front of the TV.

 

“Put it away,” he says and points a finger towards the ceiling at his bedroom upstairs.

 

“Put it away yourself.” Lottie throws the bag back towards Louis and he catches it, throwing it back like a game of hot potato.

 

“I’m older. I get to boss you around.”

 

Lottie gives him a look like, this means war, then throws her head back against the cushion and yells, “Mum!”

 

Jay appears in the doorway holding a large wooden spoon, clutching her hip, and sighs exasperatedly, “Yes, Charlotte?”

 

“Louis is being lazy and tried to crush me with his bag.”

 

Louis, who is standing too close to Jay, gets a whack on the shoulder with the spoon. He rubs the spot, scowling, and shoots daggers at Lottie. “Louis, go put your bag away then come down at play with your sisters.” Waiting until Jay has turned her back to go back into the kitchen, Louis flips Lottie off behind his back, then hurries to run off to his room before she can retaliate, like telling their mother and getting him in trouble again, despite him being twenty years old.

 

It has only been a few months since Louis has been home, but when he stands in the doorframe of his childhood bedroom, he takes a few minutes to just look at it, at all the posters hung on the walls and the old papers still strewn across the desk and the toy Transformer in the box on his dresser he got for his twelfth birthday. This room is full of little Louis taking his little sister out of her crib in the middle of the night from their parents’ room to play with her because he didn’t get enough time during the day, of little Louis pulling his first all nighter with Zayn, of little Louis struggling to figure himself out, of little Louis curling up on that exact bed with his mother after he told her he liked boys, of little Louis realizing that his passion was for filmmaking and that a life without it is a life wasted.

 

With a soft smile on his face, Louis dumps his bag onto the bed, then turns and walks out, closing the door behind him.

 

+++

 

Until dinner is ready, Louis is stuck in the living room playing a board game with his sisters, sending a text to nearly everyone in his contact list, attempting to give himself a distraction from this game of Clue that is dragging on and on. Louis loves his sisters, he really does, but they are taking forever to figure out who the murderer is and he is getting bored.

 

Finally he finds a distraction when his grandmother arrives and drags him away from the game to squeeze his cheeks so hard she almost tears them off, making sure he is taking care of himself, and by the time she is finished with him, dinner is ready.

 

Despite it being Christmas Eve, it is also Louis’ birthday, and in their house they have a tradition where the birthday boy/girl gets to choose what is for dinner, so every year since Louis was seven, they have had spaghetti and meatballs on Christmas Eve. It’s Tomlinson tradition now.

 

Jay and his grandmother quiz him while they eat, firing question after question, barely giving Louis enough time to chew and swallow before asking another question about school or friends or how the film festival went. He feels like he is thirteen years old again at a family reunion being interrogated by relatives, only this time it is his own mother doing the interrogation.

 

“Lottie,” Jay says, tapping her fork against Lottie’s plate. “put your phone away and pay attention to dinner.”

 

Lottie waits until Jay looks away before huffing quietly and rolling her eyes. Louis smirks. He remembers being like that, hating anything automatically that had to do with his family. He’s glad he got over that stage, though, because once he went off to university he realized how much he really loves his family and how lucky he is to have them.

 

“Ooh,” Fizzy says as she reaches over Louis to stab her fork into a meatball. “Are you texting your boyfriend?”

 

If looks could kill, Fizzy would be dead instantly. Lottie apparently did not want that tidbit of information announced at the dinner table, more specifically in front of Louis.

 

“What? You’ve got a boyfriend now?” Louis glances over at his mother, who is smiling down at her plate. “Mum! Why didn’t you tell me?”

 

“It’s not really any of my business to tell you.”

 

“Why not! She’s my sister! Who is it? Is he nice? Please tell me he’s not the captain of the footie team or something.”

 

“You know Louis, just because the footie captain fetish thing didn’t work out for you, doesn’t mean it won’t work out for me,” Lottie says with a quirk of the eyebrow.

 

“Hey,” Louis says. “I’ll have you know that if I hadn’t broken my arm and had to sit out, I could've have had him by the end of the season. My butt looked fantastic in those footie shorts, something not even a straight boy can resist.”

 

“Enough,” Jay scolds, looking between Louis and the twins, who are gazing intently at Louis with wide eyes.

 

Always the one who can’t keep her nose out of other people’s business, Fizzy asks, “What about you Louis? Have you got a boy?”

 

Louis stares at her and takes a long drink of water.

 

“Ooh!” Fizzy squeals, twisting in her seat to look past Lottie to their mother. “Mum, did you also know about this and thought it ‘wasn’t your business’?” she asks, lifting her hands to do air quotations.

 

“No,” Jay says. “I didn’t know Louis had a boyfriend.”

 

“I don’t,” Louis protests, debating how believable it would be if he suddenly announced that he has to use the restroom and hides in there for the rest of the night.

 

“But you want one, if the look on your face is anything to judge by,” his grandmother says, and, well, Louis does not deny that. He shrugs, pushes back his chair from the table, and says loudly, “So what’s for dessert?”

“Hold on.” Jay gets up, collecting everyone’s empty dishes, and takes them out into the kitchen. They hear the sound of the dishes clanking as she sets them in the sink, then the fridge door, and Jay comes back with a birthday cake, twenty one candles ablaze on top of it. Louis smiles at her as she sets it down in front of him.

 

“Start us off, Charlotte,” his grandmother says, and Lottie begins singing happy birthday to him, the rest of his sisters joining in, even the tiny baby twins at the end of the table shaking their fists along happily in their booster chairs. As they sing, Louis pretends to conduct them; he is never really sure what to do when people sing to him. When they finish he leans forward and blows out the candles, taking a bow as well as he can while sitting when they clap.

 

“Now,” Jay says. “Louis’ birthday present.” She disappears from the room again, appearing a few moments later with a wrapped present. She passes it down the line of children, and Louis takes it from Lottie, surprised that he actually gets a present. He hadn’t expected one, didn’t really need one anyway, since his mother was paying for his tuition. He would have been happy with simply that.

 

Louis pushes back from the table to go a stand next to Ernest and Doris, setting the present down in between them. “Wanna help me unwrap this?” he says to them even though they can’t understand what he is saying. Jay smiles softly at Louis as he takes Doris’ hand and latches it onto a strip of the paper, helping her to tear it away from the box.

 

Tiny piece by tiny piece, Louis uses the twins’ hands to tear the wrapping paper. By the time they finish, Louis thinks he may need a whole new present and cake, because by now he has probably turned twenty two.

 

He uses his own hands to open the cardboard box. He had expected maybe some handmade paintings done by the two pairs of twins and a shirt from the rest of the family, but what he finds instead makes his mouth drop open and his heart stop in his chest.

 

“No way,” are all the words he can manage, lifting the camera out of the box, staring at it with disbelief. “Mum.” He glances up to find her with her hands clasped under her chin, head tilted slightly as she looks at him. “Is this a joke?”

 

Lottie punches him in the side. “Shut up, you know it’s not.”

 

“It is the one you wanted, right?” Jay asks.

 

“Yeah,” Louis says, setting it back down on the table gently. He can’t even hold it right now, is too scared he is going to suddenly forget how to stand and smash it. Leave it to him to do something stupid like that, honestly.

 

Louis steps over to his mother and wraps his arms around her neck in a tight embrace, resting his chin on her shoulder. “Thank you,” he whispers in her ear.

 

“Thank your grandmother too, baby. She pitched in.”

 

When Louis pulls away from Jay he moves over to his grandmother and hugs her tightly too, profusely thanking her and insisting that she is the best grandmother on the planet. Lottie takes personal offense to that and kicks him in the back of the leg.

 

“Hey, aren’t you going to tell me I’m the best sister on the planet?”

 

“You didn’t help buy me a two hundred pound camera that I’ve been wanting for my birthday.”

 

“You don’t know that.”

 

Louis quirks a disbelieving eyebrow. “Did you?”

 

“No,” Lottie says. “But you didn’t know that.”

 

“Take that up to your room and we can eat the cake,” Jay says. Louis obliges, and when he comes back down, the cake is already cut and passed out, and Louis pouts exaggeratedly as he sits down in front of his slice.

 

“What ever happened to the birthday boy gets the first bite?”

 

The only response he gets is some eyerolls and a half-hearted shrug from Fizzy. Louis takes that as the cake is so delicious that they don’t want to speak. It is delicious, and the hot chocolate Louis’ grandmother makes them while they all sit in the living room afterwards is delicious too.

 

As a twenty one year old man now, maybe he should be out at a club with friends getting smashed to celebrate his older age, but sitting in front of the TV sipping on hot chocolate with his family, Louis thinks that he doesn’t really need that to be happy.

 

+++

 

The next morning Louis is woken at an ungodly hour by a heavy weight dropping onto his stomach, pushing all of the air out of his lungs. He groans and pushes at the body, bodies, on top of him until they go toppling off the bed.

 

“Get up Louis!” one of them squeals, Daisy. Louis squints open an eye. The weak winter sunlight is hardly beginning to filter in through the window, and outside everything is completely silent. It can’t be even eight o’ clock yet.

 

“What time is it?” he groans.

 

“Doesn’t matter!” Phoebe says as she scrambles up from the floor and back onto the bed. “It’s Christmas, Louis! Get up!”

 

“Five more minutes.”

 

“No! Everyone else is waiting for you.”

 

Louis sighs loudly. Despite loving Christmas and loving his family, waking up before nine is a sin in his book, no matter the occasion. He figures he won’t get any more sleep, though, with the twins bouncing around on the foot of his bed, so he pulls himself out of bed and puts on a sweatshirt before following them down the staircase.

 

Louis’ mother is standing by the stove, and as he passes Louis grabs a half-cooked pancake off the pan, biting into the still-liquidy dough. Daisy makes a face at that, but keeps tugging him into the living without a word about it. He drops onto the sofa with a large groan, rubbing at his eyes, trying to muster the energy to complain when Fizzy sits on his legs.

 

Jay comes in a few minutes later and hands out plates of pancakes, fully-cooked this time. When they all have time to get a few bites in, Daisy and Phoebe get too excited to wait, and start organizing the presents into piles, Louis’ own small pile at his feet. He doesn’t care when his is only about a fourth of the size of the others’; a camera for his birthday was more than he could have asked for, and if all he got for Christmas was a pack of M&Ms, he would be content with that.

 

The twins are about two presents in when Louis gets an idea and tells them to wait. He dashes back up the stairs to his bedroom to grab his new camera, coming back down the stairs at a considerably slower, pace, the camera strap around his neck. He looks stupid, probably, but he is not taking any chances of dropping it.

 

While the twins resume unwrapping their presents then move on to Fizzy and Lottie, Louis snaps pictures of them, each shot looking a little different because he is playing around with the settings, trying to get adjusted to the new features of the camera. He is scrolling through the pictures he took, deleting the blurry ones, before noticing that everyone is silent. He glances up to find everyone’s eyes on him.

 

“What?”

 

Jay laughs. “Are you going to open your presents or are you saving them for next Christmas?”

 

Louis blushes and turns the camera off, setting it safely next to him on the end table. “Hand them here, then, Daisy.”

 

Daisy hands them up to him one by one as he unwraps them. Most of them contain clothes, and one is a pack of Marvel superhero socks. Louis gasps and starts pulling the Spiderman pair over his feet immediately. “These are sick!” he says, wiggling his feet. He snaps a picture of them, making Fizzy roll her eyes.

 

“You are probably the most boring person on Earth.”

 

“Fizzy, when you get to be as old as me,” Louis says. “you appreciate things like socks. Especially socks like these.” If he hadn’t just gotten a camera last night, Louis would proclaim these socks the best Christmas present he has ever gotten in a long time.

 

Jay opens her presents from the siblings up after that, some drawings done by the twins, a sweater from Lottie, a mug from Fizzy, and a book series from Louis. She hugs them all, then tells them to get out of her house so she can start reading the first book.

 

Laughing, Louis pulls a heavier coat over his sweatshirt and puts on some boots, trudging out into the snow into after his sisters. Lottie and Fizzy follow him at a slower pace, pulling their phones at with scowls on their faces, watching Louis and the twins through narrowed eyes, rightfully suspicious, because when Lottie turns her back, Louis throws a huge snowball and hits her square in the back.

 

She screams loudly and jumps to turn around, shoving her phone inside her pocket and leaning down to make a snowball. Louis claps a hand over his mouth to stifle the loud laugh, and ducks behind the half-built fort that Daisy and Phoebe are constructing. They squeak as a snowball goes flying past their heads and duck down beside him.

 

“You’ve angered the demon!” Daisy says.

 

Louis laughs. “It’s me and you girls against Fizzy and Lottie, okay? Start making snowballs and I’ll hit them. They haven’t got a fort yet.”

 

Phoebe nods and starts determinedly making snowballs, setting them into a pile near Louis’ feet for him to reach easily, while Daisy builds their fort taller so that the top of Louis’ head is hidden from incoming projectiles.

 

He peeks his head over the top when she finishes, a snowball clutched in each of his mittened hands, and throws them towards Fizzy when he spots her. She just barely dodges them, but loses her balance in the process and falls flat on her butt in a snow drift. “No fair!” she yells. “It’s three against two and you guys have a fort!”

 

Louis yells back, “Life isn’t fair, sweetie!” then throws another snowball. This time, still on her butt, she is unable to dodge it and it explodes on her chest, dusting her face with snow. Even from twenty feet away, Louis can see her face go red with either cold or anger. She stands back up with a new determination and runs behind the tiny fort that Lottie has hastily built.

 

“Hurry up with the snowballs!” Louis says. “This is war, we have no time for idleness!” Louis ducks back down into safety to help the twins stockpile their snowballs. “Okay, I’m gonna sneak around and push over their-“ He is cut off when their fort explodes, burying the three siblings beneath a huge pile of snow. Lottie is standing above them, head thrown back in a laugh. Louis stares helplessly up at her as she leans down to get a handful of snow. “Don’t you dare,” he says. She shrugs and drops the snow onto his face.

 

Daisy and Phoebe manage to free themselves and tackle Lottie to the ground while Louis tries to wipe the cold snow off his face. When he gets as much of it gone as he can, he crawls over to where the twins have got Lottie’s arms pinned above her head and are shoveling snow up her shirt, making her scream so loud Louis wonders how it doesn’t hurt her throat. He laughs and stares down at her, ignoring her pleas to get the girls off of her. “Revenge is sweet, my dear sister.” Lottie glares at him.

 

Eventually, though, when the twins have packed enough snow into her shirt that she looks nine months pregnant, Louis pulls them off of her and turns and runs as fast as he can go. It isn’t fast enough, though, because seconds later he is pushed to the ground by Fizzy, who must have finally gotten the courage to come out from their fort. “You’ll pay for that!” she screeches.

 

“Never!” Louis yells back, squirming free from her grasp and taking off running again. Having nowhere to go but the hundred yard radius of their backyard, Louis runs in a circle around the perimeter of the yard while Fizzy chases him. Now is when he starts regretting dropping out of football, because after about five minutes of this, Fizzy overtakes him and pushes him to the ground again, throwing playful punches into his side that he can hardly feel because of the huge coat he is wearing. She dumps a large clump of snow onto his face then rolls away, lying face up in the snow.

 

Spluttering, Louis spits out the snow that had gotten into his mouth, and tries to shake off the rest of it from his face. “If my face wasn’t currently developing minor frostbite, I would beat you up for that,” he says.

 

“You wouldn’t,” Fizzy responds.

 

Louis half-heartedly throws a hastily made snowball in her direction in response.

 

+++

 

Jay is waiting for them with five cups of hot chocolate and a huge pile of blankets when they come inside. After pulling off the outerwear and boots, Louis runs upstairs to change into dry clothes. He is pulling a pair of Ironman socks onto his numb feet when his phone lights up with a text on his bedside table. Smiling, Louis reaches over to grab it.

 

Harry Styles: im so mad at you

 

Louis’ stomach drops, his heart jumping to three hundred beats per minute in less than a second. Harry has found out, then. That’s the only explanation. He has found out that Louis has an embarrassing crush on him and only agreed to help with his project for that reason. Just in case that is not the reason, though, Louis sends back why ?

 

A response comes less than a minute later when Louis is downstairs under a mountain of blankets sipping on a cup of hot chocolate.

 

you never told me it was your birthday :(

 

Louis lets out a sigh of relief, disguising it as one of content when Jay looks over at him with a raised eyebrow. Thank God. Harry hasn’t found out yet and doesn’t actually hate him.

 

didnt think it was that important! besides, you never asked

 

not that important??!!!!! Harry sends back, and Louis laughs. since when is legally being old enough to drink in america deemed as not important????

 

ive only been to america once when i was six so

 

hold on

 

Louis frowns at that message. He locks his phone and turns his attention back to the TV, rubbing at his numb feet with his now freed hand, trying to chafe some warmth back into them. A few minutes later his phone lights up again, this time not with a text but with a call. Louis smiles and clicks accept.

 

“Hello?”

 

“I’m going to buy you something.”

 

Louis rolls his eyes. “Don’t Harry. I’ve already gotten enough presents. As a matter of fact, I’m wearing these awesome Ironman socks right now-“

 

“Don’t change the subject,” Harry says. Louis can almost see the pout of his face even though they are miles apart, his lips tugging down into a frown, eyebrows wrinkled, nose scrunched up, in that adorable expression that crumbles Louis’ self restraint and always makes him poke at Harry’s dimples. “What do you want?”

 

“Nothing,” Louis says, more adamantly this time. “Seriously Harry. Being your friend is enough,” he jokes.

 

Harry laughs, and Louis smiles triumphantly, making his heart leap in his chest more than he would like to admit. “Still. You’re doing me such a big favor. The least I can do is buy you something for your birthday.”

 

“You don’t owe me anything. I’m doing it because I want to.”

 

“Louis,” Harry says. “You are literately helping me pass university.”

 

“Harry,” Louis whines back.

 

“Fine! It’ll be a surprise then.”

 

Louis realizes that arguing is futile, so he just sighs and says, “Don’t spend more than twenty dollars on me.”

 

“We’ll see,” Harry says. “Did you have a nice birthday, though? And Christmas?”

 

“It was good. I’m at my mum’s house with all my sisters. Are you having a nice Christmas?”

 

“I’m currently locked in my grandma’s bathroom inside her bathtub because my little cousins won’t stop trying to braid my hair.”

 

Louis laughs, imagining Harry struggling to get away from a mob of little girls tugging on his hair. “Let them do it,” he says. “Embrace the lifestyle, Harry.”

 

Harry pauses, then says, “Fine. I’ll do it.” Louis can heard rustling from the other side of the line as Harry presumably gets out from the bath, and once he is out, a voice yell, “Harry!”

 

“How did they find me already?” Harry whispers into the phone. “I’ve got to go to use both of my hands to defend myself. I’ll text you later.”

 

“Bye. Have fun!” Louis says mischievously with fake enthusiasm. He doesn’t notice that he had been smiling the whole time while talking to Harry and still is even after hanging up, until he looks up and sees Jay looking at him from over the top of her glasses.

 

“What?”

 

“Is that your boyfriend, then?”

 

“No,” Louis says with a scowl. “He’s my friend.”

 

Jay gives him a knowing look before going back to her book. Louis sighs, not even bothering to argue further. Louis tries his best to mask his feelings for Harry, but not even all his practice with the theatre in high school could have prepared him for trying to pretend that he only wants a friendship with Harry.

 

-

 

An hour later, Louis gets an uncaptioned selfie from Harry pulling a cheesy face, two French braids hanging down off the side of his face. Louis, smiling like an idiot, hesitates only a moment before saving it to his camera roll.

 

+++

 

The rest of the week is spent lounging around the house, going out for an extremely early breakfast in the middle of the night with Lottie and Fizzy because they went on a Lord of the Rings marathon and were too lazy to cook anything, a particularly disastrous trip to the ice skating rink, and taking walks around the neighborhood just for an excuse to use his new camera. It flies by, and before he knows it, Louis is hugging his family goodbye and getting in his car to make the long journey back to London.

 

Having left around lunch time, Louis gets back around two, before the big rush of students also coming back is due. Thank God, really. He is not in the mood to have to wrestle past a dozen people just to get up to his dorm room.

 

Zayn is still at his parents’ house until later tonight since he does not have any classes until Wednesday and doesn't have to get up early tomorrow, so Louis is stuck alone in the quiet room, already missing the noise of being at home with all his siblings. He resorts to pulling up an illegal stream of Friends and listening to that in the background while browsing aimlessly through Twitter, bored out of his mind. That is, until he gets a message from Harry asking if he is back at school yet. He had told Harry he is coming back today but not what time.

 

_i got in about an hour and a half ago yeah_

_wanna come to my room i have your presentttttt_

 

Louis rolls his eyes. He is still adamant that Harry need not have gotten him anything, but Harry is almost as stubborn as he is, and Louis knows arguing about it will only lead to an actual fight, something he doesn’t particularly desire to have with Harry.

 

Louis doesn’t answer, but less than five minutes later he shows up at Harry’s room. The door is wide open so, shrugging, Louis walks right in to find Harry spread out on his bed, painfully lacking anything but a pair of sweatpants. The sight brings an immediate blush to Louis’ face. He tries to cover it up with a joke. “You know, you shouldn’t leave your door open like that. An axe murderer could come in and kill you.”

 

“True,” Harry agrees, twisting his head to see Louis, making the muscles in his back contract in a way that makes Louis want to either run his hands over them or turn and run. “for normal people, except any potential murderer would see my gorgeous face and realize they can’t kill someone so beautiful.”

 

“A bit vain, innit?” Louis comes over to stand beside Harry, and since he doesn’t move over to make room for Louis, drops down right on his back, legs hanging out over the side of the bed. Normally he wouldn’t do things like that with other friends, but Harry has never minded his touchiness, so the only thing Louis holds back around him is his desire to kiss him.

 

Harry groans exaggeratedly underneath him. “You’re killing me! I can’t breathe!” he protests. In response, Louis bounces a few times, biting a cheeky grin down. Harry pushes back and dumps Louis onto the foot of the bed. Louis squeaks, kicking his foot out and hitting Harry in the shoulder as he turns around. “I’ll get you for that,” Harry says, trying to look intimidating by squinting his eyes and wrinkling his eyebrows.

 

A very unmanly scream tears itself from Louis’ lungs as Harry lunges forward with his arms outstretched, fingers digging into Louis’ side. Of course Harry would tickle him. Of course.

 

Being considerably smaller and weaker than Harry, Louis can’t push him away and can only kick his legs, but since Harry is sitting off to the side of him, that doesn’t do much. Harry doesn’t relent, continuing to tickle Louis, who is gasping for air around his laughter, pleading for Harry to let him go. Harry doesn’t listen until Louis cannot even talk anymore, tears streaming down his face, stomach aching from laughing so hard. As soon as Harry backs off, Louis twists and connects his foot with Harry’s shoulder again, not hitting hard, just enough to push Harry backwards a bit, sticking his tongue out and scrunching his nose as if taunting Harry to try and tickle him again. Harry leans forward. “I’ll do it again. I’ll tickle you until you die.”

 

Louis raises an eyebrow. “I thought you said it’s impossible to kill someone who is gorgeous.”

 

Harry pauses, taking a moment to act like he is considering that, then says, “I’ll make an exception.”

 

“Ooh, so you admit that I’m gorgeous.” Okay, maybe he is flirting, but he has always been a big flirt. He flirts with girls, he flirts with boys, he even flirts with Zayn. It’s harmless, not that big of a deal. Just because it is Harry who is on the receiving end does not make it any different this time. Just two lads having a good laugh. Totall platonic.

 

“Hmm, maybe,” Harry says. He flops down on his side to lie adjacent next to Louis. Suddenly he is too close, his face close enough that Louis can feel his exhales, and Louis wants to pull away, wants to run out of this room and never come back, but that would give him away, so with a thumping heart, Louis forces himself to stay still and stare at Harry inches from his face.

 

“Well. That’s good to know.” Laying this close, Louis can’t really help it when his eyes flicker down to Harry’s lips, which are opened slightly and tinged red from where he has a bad habit of biting them. Harry sucks in a quiet breath, and usually Louis would not notice something that subtle, but right now he swears he can feel every little detail of Harry’s body, the way his eyelashes are fluttering as his eyes flit across Louis’ face, his long legs that are hanging off the edge of the bed, his long hair that, lying down, falls around his face like a frizzy brown halo.

 

Then Harry reaches out and touches Louis’ face to brush away a strand of hair that had fallen in his eye, and the coldness of his fingers snaps Louis back into reality. He sits up abruptly and puts on the biggest smile he can manage, looking around the room. “So where is my present, Styles?”

 

For a few heartbeats Harry doesn’t say anything or move, and Louis is afraid he is going to yell at Louis for whatever just happened, but then he gets up and pulls a box out from under the bed. “Here,” he says, handing it to Louis. “Wrapped it myself.” He pokes the golden bow at the corner of the box. “Even has a little bow on it.”

 

Louis nods. “So it does. You have impressive wrapping skills, if I do say so myself.”

 

Harry hums in agreement. “I’ve been told I’m good with my hands.” Well.

 

Louis ignores that statement and takes the bow off, gently setting it on top of his own head, making Harry laugh, before tearing off the wrapping paper. He laughs when he sees what is underneath. “You got me a Spiderman Lego set?”

 

Harry shrugs. “You said you liked Spiderman.”

 

“I do,” he says. “I still stand by me saying that you didn’t need to get me anything, but thank you.” He hesitates a second then scoots over to wrap his free arm around Harry’s waist, leaning into him when Harry hugs him back. Louis smiles into his shoulder when he feels Harry clutch the fabric on the back of his shirt, remaining a beat too long than what is socially acceptable before pulling away.

 

“It’s not stupid, is it?” Harry asks, bottom lip snagged between his teeth. He looks so unsure, and Louis wants to kiss away that expression, pulling his bottom lip out from his teeth so that Louis can bite it instead. “I didn’t know what to get you, you didn’t really-“

 

“No, Harry, it’s perfect. We’ll have to build it together sometime, yeah?”

 

Harry’s lips tip upward into a small smile. “Yeah.”

 

Louis sets the box down near the door then comes back to sit on the bed with his legs crossed, leaned up against the cold wall. “Did you enjoy your Christmas?”

 

“It was great. My scalp still hurts, though. Who knew braiding was so painful?” Harry looks so distressed by the thought of that event again that Louis laughs, making Harry pull a funny face at him, which does nothing but makes Louis laugh more.

 

“You’re such an idiot.”

 

“Am not,” Harry says with an offended-looking frown. “You are.”

 

“You bought me a Lego toy set,” Louis points out.

 

“Heyyy,” Harry says.

 

“I’m kidding, Harry. Now hand me that blanket or I’m going to turn into a human icicle.”

 

+++

 

January passes in the blink of an eye, as does February, March, and April. Louis feels like one night he went to sleep with snow and the ground and woke up to find it the last day of April.

 

School has kicked into full gear with each professor cramming the last few chapters of material in before finals, making it so that Louis’ typical day goes something like this: Wake up, drag himself out of bed, rush to his classes, somehow find time to have an extremely unhealthy meal, stay up until one in the morning researching and doing papers, repeat. It leaves him with barely any time to see Zayn, his roommate, let alone any of his other friends, although Louis knows they are all busy with their own classes and don’t mind that he has fallen of the face of the Earth for the last few weeks. The only good thing in his life right now is that thanks to English class, he sees Harry almost every day, and they both find time on Sunday to work on Harry’s project for about an hour or two. It’s hardly enough, but even with that limited interaction, Louis finds himself dreading the end of the year. The only reason he and Harry see each other so often is because of school and the project, but once that is over, who knows if or when they will be able to hang out over the summer, or if Harry will even want to.

 

Louis knows in the back of his mind that Harry is actually his friend now and is not that big of a douchebag to completely ditch Louis once the year ends. He puts just as much effort into the friendship as Louis does, texting him at odd hours of the day, finding time for them to go see a movie or grab something to eat, even just sitting in one of their rooms in silence to work on assignments. But Louis is an idiot, and sometimes he feels the urge to invite Harry to stay a few weeks in Doncaster over the summer  just so they won’t have to be separated for too long.

 

“Ugh,” Harry groans, letting his head roll sideways so that it thunks against the wall.

 

Louis looks up from his computer. “What?”

 

“Do you think if I dropped out of school I could still live my life comfortably?”

 

“Just audition for The X Factor or something,” Louis says as he goes back to writing his paper.

 

“It’s rigged, though,” Harry says matter-of-factly. “They always make it so the cute one with the okay voice wins.”

 

“Hmm,” Louis hums. “You’ll be sure to win then.” He grins cheekily when Harry pushes at his shoulder.

 

“You would win if you wore those glasses.”

 

“Are you saying I look cute with my glasses?” Louis fires back like his heart didn’t just stop beating completely.

 

“That statement is open for interpretation,” Harry answers, and does Louis want to punch him. He is always doing things like this, flirting playfully with Louis, so often that sometimes Louis wonders if he knows how much Louis likes him and is doing it just to mess with him. Other times, usually after having a bit to drink, Louis thinks that maybe Harry feels the same way, but those thoughts never last long.

 

“I hate you.”

 

“Too bad,” Harry says. “Cause I think I’m in love with you.” He bats his eyelashes coyly, and that’s it. Louis is going to die right here in this room, and the police are going to his body with absolutely nothing wrong with it and his death is going to be pronounced a biological phenomenon. His eyes snap back down to stare at his computer screen, and he swears he can make out Harry grinning mischievously in the corner of his eyes, but he doesn’t dare look back at him, is too frightened he would try and kiss him if he did.

 

A few minutes of silence pass after that, until Harry slams his laptop shut and puts it on the bedside table, stretching his muscles with a loud yawn. Louis looks down at the clock and almost screams in frustration when he seems it is nearly eleven o’ clock. He hasn’t even gotten half of his paper done yet.

 

“Are we still good for Sunday?” Harry asks.

 

“Huh? Oh, yeah. It should be one of our last times getting together, huh, since your project is due in what? Four weeks?”

 

“Four, yeah. It’s crazy.”

 

“What is?”

 

“It feels like it has been no time since the film festival, but it also seems like ages ago. I can’t believe I only met you a few months ago.”

 

“I know,” Louis agrees. “Time flies when you’re having fun, I guess.”

 

“Aw, you big sap.”

 

“’S true,” Louis says seriously, nodding. He stands up and stretches his back, sighing when it gives a satisfying pop. “I should get going.”

 

Harry puckers his lips and makes grabby hands at Louis from where he lying on the bed, curled up in a small ball. “Don’t I get my goodbye kiss?”

 

Louis freezes. He thinks if a car came flying through the window straight at him right now, he wouldn’t have the incentive to move.

 

“I’m kidding, jeez, Mr. Heterosexual,” Harry says with an eyeroll. “At least come give me a hug, though.” That Louis can manage. He bends over and gives Harry a quick hug.

 

“I’m not,” he says after pulling back.

 

Harry tilts his head with a quizzical look on his face. “Not what?”

 

“Mr. Heterosexual.”

 

He can see the immediate change in Harry’s face, first shock, his mouth falling open a bit, his eyebrows pulling in, but it’s gone in a heartbeat, replaced by something Louis can’t put a finger on. “Oh.” Louis forces a smile even though doing anything but standing still feels like a dead weight, because surely he just fucked things up, then waves.

 

“I’m going now. Good night Harry.”

 

He doesn’t hear Harry say anything back as he turns and leaves the room.

 

+++

“I know I have, Zayn. The look on his face, oh God. God, I’ve gone and ruined everything, because I fucking like him. I’ve ruined it just like I ruin everything.” Louis is whimpering like a child, bundled up in Zayn arms like he is one and Zayn is his mother, but right now he cannot find it in himself to care, to even think about anything but that look on Harry’s face.

 

The fact that Zayn is not saying anything does nothing to calm Louis down. It does the opposite, in fact. Zayn always has something to say to him, can always find a way to at least make Louis stop panicking over whatever he is at the time, but even he can’t find something positive to say right now. Maybe he knows it isn’t any use trying to console a heartbroken Louis that just got simultaneously rejected and cut off because he creeped his friend out.

 

Harry must know now that all of that flirting was not harmless, at least not on Louis’ end. Maybe he was okay with it because he thought Louis was straight and that flirting would not change anything between them, but now that he knows Louis isn’t, he finally understands what more there was than initially visible at the surface.

 

“Zayn, say something.”

 

“I don’t know what to say, Lou,” Zayn answers. Louis can hear pity in his voice, so he doesn’t ask him to speak again. He hates it when Zayn’s voice gets like that. He doesn’t need pity, he needs someone to slap these stupid feelings out of him so he can go back to living his life and being friends with Harry without it being extremely awkward.

 

For what could have been minutes or hours, Louis lays in Zayn’s arms, both of them drifting in out of sleep. I wish I fell for Zayn instead, Louis finds himself thinking, in a state between consciousness and dreams. It would have been easier that way, definitely. They could have had a fairytale story to tell their grandchildren years from now – they met when they were seven years old at school, became best friends, and over the years realized best friends just did not do it anymore. So they fell in love and got married and had children and that was the end of that. There would have been no awkward first family meetings, because their families already knew each other, and when they moved into their dorm room together, instead of getting into a food fight, they could have made love on the floor, a toast to their new life together. And Zayn wouldn’t have broken his heart with just one expression, Louis knows that.

 

Except Louis never liked Zayn that way, and Zayn never liked him that way, and Louis didn’t fall for Zayn, he fell for Harry. Fell for him, hard. There is no denying it anymore. In a way, Louis had known for weeks. That feeling bubbling in his chest when he was around Harry, like there is some chemical reaction going on in his heart, threatening to burst out of his heart – that doesn’t happen around someone who you only like as a crush. And this feeling, this sinking feeling where Louis feels as though he is not sitting on a bed but sinking into the Earth, plunging miles deeper and deeper each second – that doesn’t happen unless someone you love just rejected you.

 

It must be around two in the morning when Louis’ phone buzzes beneath him. He debates pretending like he never felt it and going back to sleep, for real this time, but the not knowing of what Harry said, because he knows it is Harry, is unbearable. Moving slowly so as not to wake Zayn, who is in a deep slumber now, Louis reaches beneath the covers and pulls out his phone from where it was trapped between Zayn’s abdomen and his back.

 

Louis is not surprised when the notification says he has two texts from Harry Styles. What does surprise him, though, is when he unlocks it and sees that they are goodnight lou :) xx and you and zayn should have breakfast with me tomorrow morning if you want! (if youre even still awake)

 

Louis isn’t naïve enough to think that Harry is unaffected by what happened, whatever happened, tonight. Maybe he is the kind of person who can’t end things over a text, even if it is just a friendship. Tomorrow morning, then. Louis has until tomorrow morning to prepare himself for Harry ending their friendship because Louis ruined it.

 

+++

 

Had it been up to him, Louis would have stayed in bed all day, all month, all year, until the university noticed and kicked him out for being the laziest person alive. However, after Louis has been awake for half an hour watching Zayn do something on his laptop, Zayn gets a mixture of pissed off and fed up with Louis moping, so he throws a wad of clothes at Louis and tells him they are going down to get breakfast.

 

“You’ll have to carry me there, Zayn. I’m not going.”

 

“They’re serving chocolate muffins today.”

 

Louis narrows his eyes. “Fine. Only this time, though.”

 

Zayn looks over at him and opens his mouth to say something, but then shuts it again and simply nods his head. “Get dressed, then. Hurry up, I’m starving.”

 

Louis rolls sideways until he falls to the floor and stays there as he pulls off his joggers and pulls on a clean pair and exchanges his sweatshirt for a fluffy white jumper. He groans as Zayn pulls him up into a standing position, and, exaggerating, Louis stumbles and falls into his arms, leaning on him, like baby deer that is just learning to walk. Zayn mutters under his breath but doesn’t say anything out loud until they enter the cafeteria and Louis is still wobbling around from side to side like a drunk.

 

“Lou, stand up straight. We look like idiots.”

 

Louis scowls, but miraculously gains use of his legs again.

 

They are standing in line for the promised chocolate chip muffins, when Louis feels a familiar hand on his back. He cringes away from it and turns, bracing himself for whatever is to come. He had hoped Harry would have already been in and out of breakfast to go do some sunrise yoga or something.

 

Harry is looking down at him, soft lips curled into a small smile. “Good morning, Louis.”

 

“Morning,” Louis breathes. He looks over at Zayn for help. Luckily the man comes to his rescue, popping a hip out and raising his eyebrows into an expression that makes him look insulted. “I’m here too, y’know, Harry.”

 

Harry tears his eyes away from Louis for a split second to flick across Zayn. “Good morning to you too.” He looks back at Louis, who squirms uncomfortably under his gaze. “Can I talk to you for a sec?”

 

Zayn raises an eyebrow at Louis, and he nods, so Zayn takes his breakfast and walks away to find them a table to sit at.

 

“What do you want to talk about?” Louis asks calmly, like he doesn’t feel as if he is about to throw up everywhere.

 

Harry takes a deep breath, running a hand over his face and through his hair. He stares down at Louis with his brows furrowed. “I just – you came out to me last night.”

 

“Kind of, yeah. And?” Any minute now, any minute, and Harry is going to ask why the hell he did all those things he did, then, if he isn’t straight, and tell him they can’t be friends anymore.

 

“And I was kind of a jerk about it. Like, I didn’t say anything, but that’s the thing – I didn’t say anything. You probably thought I was weirded out – I-“ Harry shakes his head with another deep breath. “I don’t care about that, Louis. Something like that shouldn’t matter so I won’t let it.”

 

Louis turns away, ducking his head to stare at his shoes.

 

“I’m so sorry, Louis, I’m not an asshole. I don’t care if you’re gay or straight or bi or anything else. I still want to be your friend.”

 

Louis has to physically restrain himself from snorting. Harry doesn’t know how stupid he sounds right now, but Louis won’t be the one to tell him. He looks back up and nods slowly, taking his plate from the counter. “Sure.”

 

“Sure what?”

 

“Sure,” Louis says again, then turns and walks over to where Zayn is sitting down.

 

Zayn glances up from his phone when he sees Louis sit down. His eyebrows furrow with concern and he goes to say something, but Louis speaks before he can, forcing a smile so Zayn won’t worry. “I’m fine. Do you think we can go to the library to work on something today? I have a big paper due next week that I really can’t let be late.”

 

+++

 

The next four weeks are awkward, to say the least. Neither of them says anything about “that night,” as Louis has begun to think of it, but neither of them make an effort to try and put that behind them. Inside jokes fall short when Harry makes one, Louis staring at him for a few seconds with a distant expression on his face like he doesn’t understand and not laughing. After three days of that, Harry stops making them.

 

On the plus side, although they had been rushed to complete Harry’s project, the lack of messing around lets them finish it five whole days before it is due. Louis stays a few hours at Harry’s project to finish editing the last bits, and just so he can say he helped if asked, Harry sits with him, pacing the room out of boredom.

 

“Would you stop for one minute? You're making me anxious,” Louis snaps. He regrets it immediately when Harry’s face falls, but does not take it back. Besides, Harry was probably disturbing the people under them.

 

“Sorry,” Harry mumbles.

 

“Anyway, come over here. I’m finished now.” He waits until Harry is settled beside him, his arms pulled across his chest, Louis notices, so that they don’t brush against his own, then rewinds it to the beginning and presses play.

 

The piano begins to play with a closeup of Harry’s fingers moving across the keys, the intro repeated over and over again until Harry’s name and the title fades away. The camera pans around the room and lands on Harry, this time not on a piano but perched atop a stool, a guitar in his lap. He looks pale in the black and white filter, but as he croons the first line, his head lowered like he is in pain, it looks perfect.

 

Harry isn’t a good actor, but the way he twists his face around the words and mimics the appearance of a heartbreak almost perfectly, Louis reconsiders his acting ability. It looks as though he really is weeping over a lost lover when the first chorus begins, a repeated “don’t let me, don’t let me, don’t let me go.” He throws his head back with that as if he is screaming the lyrics to the world, and the camera swings around the catch the back of his body. From this angle, the slump of his back is more clearly visible, and I can’t change tattoo peeks out from underneath the sleeve of his shirt.

 

Louis’s eyes zero in on it, and he wonders just how connected the tattoo and this song are, how ironic it is that the only tattoo that he captured in this video is that one, not the skull or the ship or the book, which Harry explained the meanings to, saying they have nothing to do with a past lover. The only one he refused to explain was I can’t change, and hearing the lyrics to this song, seeing how Harry looks singing them, Louis understands why. If someone broke his heart like that, so much so that he got a piece of it tattooed to his skin permanently because it is such an integral part of him, he wouldn’t want to talk about it either.

 

It’s whenever Harry lifts his head to stare directly into the camera and sings, “Seems like these days I watch you from afar, trying to make you understand,” that Louis’ skin chills with goose bumps. He hopes Harry can’t feel it against his own skin.

 

Harry’s mouth falls open with the last line of the chorus, then shuts again for him to bite on his bottom lip, as he strums the guitar, the intensity of the music growing along with the intensity of Louis’ shivers. Finally he lets go off the strings for a few minutes, feigning the end of the song, then picks it back up with another quiet “don’t let me, don’t let me, don’t let me go.” The next line is louder, and with the last word the camera sweeps back to get Harry’s whole body in the shot. It only lasts a few minutes before he lets go of the guitar and it slips from his lap to the floor. Harry brings his arms forward to rest on his knees and his head falls into his hands, like the effort of sitting up through that whole song, the effort of shouting his heartbreak for everyone to hear, wore him out. It stays like that for a few seconds to capture the shaking of Harry’s shoulders, then fades into black.

 

Louis and Harry are both silent. He pushes the laptop away, then at the same time they turn to each other and say, “You’re amazing.”

 

Harry laughs, the most genuine laugh Louis has seen in the fast few weeks from him. “You made it look so good. You, like, personified it. You could feel my pain through the camera.”

 

Louis shakes his head. “All I did was put a camera down and film you. You – those lyrics. They’re breathtaking, Harry. I-I don’t know what made you, like, write them. But. They’re beautiful, really.”

 

Harry turns away. Louis can see his Adam’s apple bob, and immediately backtracks. “Sorry, I-I didn’t mean to – It’s your business, not mine. Sorry.”

Harry shakes his head. “No, it’s fine. You can guess what happened by the lyrics, but it wasn’t as bad as it sounded, y’know. I dramatized it more than a little bit. It wasn’t like-“ Harry shrugs. “It was just like any other normal heartbreak, y’know. I got over it soon enough.”

 

Louis clears his throat, wringing his hands together nervously, trying to stay still besides that. He isn’t sure if Harry is opening up to him, is about to tell him about whatever girl broke his heart and inspired him to write this song, or if he wants to drop it. Louis knows that if Harry does want to open up, he will do it by himself, and that Louis should stay quiet, but there’s still that flashing white light of jealousy in the back of his mind that wants to know who it was that broke his heart so he can be fucking awful to her. Or find her and ask what it is like to hold Harry Styles’ heart. “What was she like?” Louis whispers, quiet enough so that Harry can pretend he did not hear it if he doesn’t want to answer.

 

It takes only a second for Harry to answer. “It doesn’t matter anymore. I don’t love them anymore. Someone else, though. I fell in love with someone else.” He turns back to Louis with a dopey smile spreading on his face, and something twists in Louis’ stomach. He hopes whoever makes Harry smile like that knows how lucky they are. “I can describe them, though,  if you want.”

 

Louis doesn’t want. He’s not a masochist, and knows that that smile Harry is wearing will amplify by tenfold once he starts describing them, someone who is not Louis, and he doesn’t want that. But his mouth has a mind of its own and before he can control it, he finds himself saying, “Yes.”

 

Harry nods and leans his head back against the wall to stare up at the ceiling. “Where do I begin? They’re amazing. They’re, like, I don’t know how to say it, really. They’re so powerful. Not physically, but when they walk in a room every head turns to look at them. They’re fucking magnetic and it makes me so angry that they can’t see it.” Harry bites on his bottom lip, trying to contain a grin, Louis knows, because he can see the dimples in his cheeks. “And they are so talented and I try to tell them they’re going to go far in life, and yet they never believe me, and I don’t know whether to be endeared by their modesty or annoyed that they don’t know how amazing they are.” He turns his head slightly to look at Louis. “Have you ever fallen in love with someone, and maybe it has only been a few months, but you can hardly remember your life before them because after you met them it all seemed pointless?”

 

Louis nods. “Yes,” he breathes. You.

 

“That’s what it’s like loving them. I didn’t even speak to them before this last year, but the moment I did I knew I was fucking gone. They’re such an enigma and every day I wonder how I managed to fall for them, but I did, and I don’t regret it one bit. They’re the best thing that has ever happened to me.”

 

“Don’t you-“ Louis says, tilting his head. “Have you ever even been involved with them?”

 

“Almost once, I think, but no.”

 

“Then how are they the best thing that has happened to you? Isn’t that a bit much?”

 

Harry smiles. “No. I wish every day that we can have something more, but I would be content to sit and watch them for the rest of my life, and if trying to get them to love me back takes that long, then so be it. I don’t mind.”

 

Louis shakes his head. Harry laughs.

 

“I know it sounds stupid and reckless, but it’s not. I guess you can’t understand unless you’ve fallen as hard as I have.”

 

“I have,” Louis says without hesitation. “I’m so in love with someone, you would laugh at me if you knew just how much. They-“ He swallows. “He doesn’t like me that way, though, so I guess I’ll have to get over it. Someone should write a angsty romance novel about it, really.”

 

Harry frowns. “Neither does mine.”

 

“Neither does yours what?”

 

“They don’t know I love them. But I don’t think they would love me back even if they did know, and sometimes I really do want to tell them. Just grab their hands and shout, ‘these things are yours, how can you not see they are holding my beating heart in them, are you blind?’”

 

Louis laughs humorlessly, wondering how, even in this giant world, he ended up sitting on a bed in a tiny room with the man he loves, listening to him complain about his own tale of unrequited love. It isn’t fair. Stupid Harry, with his curly hair and green eyes and huge hands and even bigger heart, making Louis love him. Stupid Harry, with his heart that belongs to someone else.

 

Harry looks at him then, narrowing his green eyes like he is considering something. Louis wants to hide in the covers so that Harry can’t see him; he is scared he has some tell that made Harry realize who it is that Louis loves. “I’ve described mine to you. It’s your turn.”

 

“I didn’t realize we were playing a game of twenty questions about our sad, sad love lives,” Louis says, but the joke falls short in his mouth, and Harry doesn’t even make an effort to laugh and Louis doesn’t bother acting offended by it. “Fine. Okay.”

 

Describing someone you love is hard enough, but when you’re telling it to that person themself, it is even harder. Each second that ticks by is like counting down to a detonating bomb, but as hard as he tries, Louis can’t find a way to describe Harry to himself without him knowing. So fuck it, he thinks, and then the thoughts are falling unfiltered from his mouth.

 

“He’s not perfect, I know, but sometimes I think he might be. He’s kind and he’s gorgeous and he’s poetic and he’s got the most beautiful view of the world, I am envious of him sometimes. He can look at a person and know exactly what they’re feeling and why, and within five minutes, if they’re sad, he can have them feel better. I don’t know how he does it. I’ve spent twenty years trying to have even the fraction of goodness in my heart that he has in his, and I’ve failed, but when I see him like that I’m not jealous. I’m happy that I have met a person as wonderful as he is, but-“ Louis looks down at his hands that are pale and shaking, and twists them into the fabric of his shirt to steady them.

 

“But I get sad sometimes, because I know someone like me would never deserve someone like him, not in this universe at least. And it’s not fair, y’know? Like, I wish I could just stop-stop loving him because that would make it so much easier, but I can’t, and it’s fucking awful. And I don’t-“ Louis shakes his head and tilts his head back. “Nevermind.”

 

Harry is silent at he stares at him. It takes Louis a few minutes to work up the courage to look at him, but when he does, he sees not pity in his eyes, like he had expected, just plain sadness, like Harry truly aches at the thought of Louis hurting. Like Louis had said, though, Harry is unbelievably caring, so Louis doesn’t delude himself into thinking that means Harry cares for him in the same way Louis cares for him.

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“Don’t be.”

 

“If I knew him,” Harry says, ducking his head to rest it against his knees. “I don’t – Fuck, Louis. I would make him see how amazing you are, because you are. He’s an idiot if he can’t see that.”

 

Louis almost laughs. What Harry doesn’t know. “It’s not his fault. He doesn’t love me. Fine. I’m mad at myself, more, for not being able to get over it.”

 

“But you-“

 

“Harry, just listen. I’m sad about it. I’m not going to sit here and say I don’t want a relationship with him and that every time I see I have to physically stop myself from kissing him, because that would be lying, but I can’t complain about it either, because people like him don’t love people like me. Okay?”

 

Harry looks like he wants to argue, but he doesn’t. “Okay.”

 

“Good.” His laptop flashes a warning at him, ten percent battery. That is all the excuse Louis needs to get out of this room, to stop having this conversation that he never wanted to have in the first place. He e-mails the video to Harry, then shuts it off, and stretches before getting up, yawning. “I need to go write an essay now,” he says, like he is trying to convince himself more than Harry.

 

“Okay.” Harry nods a little too vigorously than needed. “Okay. Bye.”

 

Louis turns to leave, but just as he is about to open the door, Harry jumps up off the bed and grabs onto his wrist. Spinning around, Louis faces him, frowning. “What?”

 

Like he was in a trance, Harry blinks rapidly to rid himself of it, and drops Louis’ hand. “I just – Goodnight, Louis.”

 

For a minute, Louis stands there, completely trapped between the door and Harry’s body. The project is completely over now. Harry and Louis never need to talk to each other from this point on for academia. He could do it right now, and get it out of his system, and go on living his life without a constant mantra of HarryHarryHarry in his head.

 

It’s the memory of Harry’s lovesick smile that stops Louis. That kiss shouldn’t belong to Louis, it should belong to whoever makes Harry smile like that. So, feeling sick to his stomach, Louis turns and leaves.

 

+++

 

It’s a Sunday when Louis feels homesick again. With tear-blurred eyes, he thinks not of Doncaster and his mother, but of Harry, and wonders when Harry became his home.

 

The fact that it is a Sunday does not mean much, not objectively. Life goes on for everyone else. People go to church, people go to class, a group of girls outside his window go skateboarding. Louis wonders how they can do that, wonders if they knew how his chest was caving in on itself if they would still be doing those things.

 

To Louis though, Sunday has come to mean Harry, and Harry is not here with him, and he knows, he knows it’s so fucking stupid, but he can’t push away that ache in his chest no matter what he tries.

 

He wonders how old he will be before he can finally get over Harry, can finally live through a fucking Sunday without wanting to cry and scream and run away. Maybe he will die before he gets to that age, though, because surely no human can live that long.

 

+++

 

Sunday melts into Monday that melts into Tuesday that melts into Wednesday, and Wednesday means English class, which means Harry.

 

If things had been awkward after the kind-of-almost-kiss night, things are unbearable now. Louis wonders why he ever wanted to see Harry again. Things would be so much easier if he never had to see that stupid adorable face again and know that it isn’t his to kiss.

 

The second Ms. Brown dismisses them, Louis jumps out of his seat, getting to the door at a record breaking time, but Harry is right on his heels. He almost turns and yells at him to leave him alone, because both of them know all too well how awkward things have gotten, but Harry doesn’t fall back all the way back to Louis’ dorm room, so when Louis gets to the door, he is forced to acknowledge him.

 

His voice sounds almost tired when he speaks, and it doesn’t surprise Louis. He is tired. That constant numb ache to hold Harry when Harry isn't his to hold takes a beating on him. It exhausts him, and he wants it fucking over, but it can’t be over unless Harry is out of Louis’ life, and Louis doesn’t want that either.

 

“What, Harry?” he sighs.

 

“Please just hear me out, okay, just give me three minutes to speak.” He waits for Louis’ nod to continue. “I don’t know what it is between us lately, but I miss you, Louis. I miss hanging out and being idiots and goofing off and laughing until our stomachs hurt. I miss that so much, don’t you? I just – whatever it is that happened, can’t we put it behind us? Please.” Harry is practically pleading, and Louis almost caves right there.

 

Without an trace of emotion, though, he asks, “When are you presenting your video to your class?”

 

Harry’s face falls and his head lowers along with it, so that Louis can see the sweep of his eyelashes on his cheekbones. “Tomorrow,” he whispers.

 

“I’ll be there,” Louis says, then shuts the door.

 

+++

It took Louis five minutes of leaning against the wall outside, taking deep breaths with eyes squeezed shut, for him to work up the courage to open the door and walk into Harry’s classroom.

 

He knows that any effort to try and mend their friendship to what it was before would be in vain, but every time he sees Harry, there is a small piece of hope in the back of his mind, and he thinks Maybe this is the time.

 

The thing is, Louis doesn’t know how to fix it, because he is not exactly sure what broke it in the first place. There is not one set moment where Harry and Louis had a falling out, therefore it’s impossible to apologize.

 

Louis takes a deep breath, pushes himself up off the wall, and opens the door.

 

A woman is at the front of the classroom explaining something, and she only stumbles a bit on her words as Louis walks in. Harry, either hearing the door shut or the pause in her sentence, turns to look at Louis. He smiles, waves Louis over, and as Louis makes his way as silently as possible over to Harry, he can feel Harry’s eyes following him the whole way.

 

He takes the empty seat next to Harry and smiles. Harry goes to whisper something, but Louis shushes him and points a finger towards the front of the room.

 

Only a few seconds passes before the class is applauding the woman and she takes her seat with a large smile on her face. Harry closes his eyes for a second, takes a deep breath, then stands up and relocates to a desk in the front of the room as the professor pulls up his video. Louis forces himself to tear his eyes away from the back of Harry’s head and look at the screen instead.

 

The entire room is silent as the video plays. Even the second time around, Louis’ skin chills with goose bumps, and he feels that familiar twist in his gut that he always gets before presenting something, even though none of his classes or grades are related to this video. He still hopes the people like it, despite that, because it is his work, and he wants Harry to do well.

 

When it ends, it is met with a respective round of applause, and with shaking hands twisted around the hem of his shirt, Harry rises and goes to stand up in front of the screen. He smiles, dimples and everything, and bows to the applause, earning a ripple of laughter, including Louis. Sometimes he forgets how easily Harry can sway a crowd to his side, until he sees him in action for himself. Louis wonders how many other people have been in the same place as him, have fallen completely and utterly in love with Harry Styles. He needs their advice how to get over it, if that’s even possible.

 

Harry straightens back up, waiting for everyone to quiet again. “I wrote that song going through a heartbreak, as you may have guessed, and it took me a lot of time thinking about it before I decided I was comfortable sharing this with everyone. I met Louis, who is sitting back there, at the film festival held earlier this year. Meeting him convinced me once and for all that I should do my project on this song and leave whatever happened in the past in the past.”

 

Louis frowns, confused. He and Harry had never spoken a word about this besides a few nights ago. Why would meeting Louis convince Harry to get over his broken heart?

 

“I think this song really depicts the stages of heartbreak well. At first, you don’t want to admit it’s not going to work out. You do everything you can to keep it together, but sometimes every force is exerted against it, and it still falls apart, and it leaves you like a village after a tsunami, all torn up and lost of hope, and you’re still begging for them to keep you around and maybe try a bit harder.” Harry takes a deep breath.

 

“At the time this song was written, my world felt like it was falling apart, which I can now see was extremely stupid. A relationship ending isn’t your life ending, and you must not confuse it like that. I never realized that if I managed to love the wrong one so much, the love I will feel for the right one will be staggering. I think this is what I love so much about this song, and why it means so much to me.” Harry locks eyes with Louis, completely ignoring the rest of the room. “The process of writing this song made me realize that in order to gain something you have to lose something.”

 

Louis sucks in a breath and ignores the heads that twist around to look at him. He physically cannot force himself to look away from Harry until the other man does, then just stares down at his hands that are shaking in his lap.

 

“Obviously I’m not as talented enough to both write the song and shoot the video. That was Louis Tomlinson. I met him last year only, but he’s one of my best friends now, and I’m so happy we got the opportunity to work together. He’s incredibly talented and when he makes it big, I’ll be happy to point and say ‘See him? Yeah, not to brag, but he shot a music video for me.’”

 

Louis laughs and forces his eyes back up to look at Harry, who has a small smile on his face.

 

“Thank you,” Harry says with another deep bow. He comes back to sit next to Louis after the applause stops, grinning from ear to ear. “Thank you, Louis.”

 

“Thank you,” Louis says. He doesn’t say what for, but he hopes that when Harry finally figures out Louis’ feelings he will make the connection. Thank you for asking me to shoot your video. Thank you for existing in the same place as me. Thank you for letting me love you, even if you don’t know it.

 

There are only two people who go after Harry, so they are sat in the classroom for about fifteen minutes before the professor thanks them all, congratulating each student individually, before letting them out. Louis had been the first one out, hoping to avoid a long conversation with Harry if possible, but Harry is right behind him, and when he is about ten feet out the door he feels Harry’s hand on his shoulder.

 

Harry squeezes, and Louis turns with an eyeroll, prepared to make some forced sarcastic comment, but before his brain can register what is happening because it goes so fast, Harry leans in and presses a close-mouthed kiss to his cheek.

 

Louis’ mouth falls open. He is too shocked to do much else, but his heart naturally picks up speed, going at about a thousand beats per minute in less than five seconds.

 

Harry’s hand falls from his shoulder. Louis almost reaches down and puts it back, almost pulls Harry back in for another kiss, but he can’t feel his arms right now.

 

“I’m sorry,” Harry whispers. His eyes are lowered and he won’t look up to meet Louis’ gaze. “I had to. Just one time. Just one time,” he repeats. He turns, and as quick as it happened, he is gone, leaving Louis standing paralyzed in the middle of the corridor, watching Harry for as long as he can until he turns a corner and is lost from view.

 

+++

 

Louis manages to get back to his dorm by routine. His feet carry him across the campus and his hands unlock the door, all while his mind is in a complete shutdown. He can’t process what just happened, can’t decide if he is dreaming or maybe dead, or if he got teleported to an alternate universe where Harry likes him back.

 

Thank God Zayn is there when Louis returns, because he probably would have gone into a coma from his brain working too hard, struggling to piece together what the hell just happened.

 

Louis falls onto his bed, face slack, mouth still hanging open. He lifts a hand to touch his cheek, jerking it away the second it connects. All his nerve endings have migrated there, it seems, when Harry kissed him, because it almost hurts to touch it, and Louis can feel a numb buzz humming beneath his skin. He is so lost that Zayn has to say his name five times before Louis responds.

 

“Louis,” Zayn says, waving his hand in front of Louis’ eyes. Louis jerks back, almost slamming his head against the wall.

 

“What?”

 

“Why do you look like that?”

 

“Like what?”

 

“Like you’re…I don’t know. What happened?”

 

Louis locks eyes with Zayn and debates whether he should tell him or not. Normally he wouldn’t give a second thought to telling Zayn something, but right now he thinks he may be dreaming, and that Zayn will laugh at him if he says it out loud. Eventually he figures that he really has nothing to lose at this point, and says, “Harry kissed me.”

 

The sound of Zayn typing on his computer ceases immediately. His head snaps around to stare at Louis, mouth wide before splitting into a wide grin. He drops his computer onto his bed delicately and bounds over to climb up on top of Louis’ bed and bounce around like he is nine years old. After a few seconds of jumping on the bed, he falls down to his butt to sit next to Louis, nearly breaking the unsteady bed in the process.

 

“Tell me what happened exactly right now,” Zayn demands.

 

“I-I don’t really know,” Louis says, which earns a disbelieving look from Zayn. “I don’t! It just – it happened so quick, I was just walking and he turned me around and kissed me and he was like ‘I’m sorry’ and I wanted to tell him he had nothing to be sorry for but I couldn’t open my mouth, and I’m so confused because I thought he was mad at me for that one time we almost kissed but now he kissed me so I’m getting mixed signals and-“

 

“Louis,” Zayn cuts him off. “How exactly do you perceive kissing you as mixed signals? He seems pretty interested, if you ask me.”

 

“Because!” Louis exclaims. “Because he always made a joke out of the flirting and I thought he was straight because all the girls loved him and I always heard these rumors about him, and even if he was gay or bi or whatever, why would he be interested in a guy like me?” Louis points down at his Spiderman socks to prove the point.

 

“Oh my god,” Zayn groans, throwing his head back in exasperation. “I’m going to tell you something, okay? Don’t talk until I’m done.” Louis nods. “I’ve, um – I’ve been hooking up with that Niall Horan the past few months – don’t say anything -” he says when Louis’ mouth drops open. “but he is good friends with Harry, and you came up one time. I forget exactly what he said, but I was telling a story about you, and Niall laughed and said something like ‘No wonder Harry is obsessed with him.’ So I asked him what he meant and he said that the first day of semester Harry came to Niall going on and on about this cute boy in his English class, and it only got worse after you agreed to help him.”

 

Louis is shaking his head with his mouth clamped shut, not speaking a word.

 

“It’s true, Louis. I wouldn’t make this up.”

 

“No, you – Niall must have, then. Harry doesn’t like me. He said he never noticed me before the festival, I-“

 

“He lied, then, Louis!” Zayn says. “You also said you hardly knew him, don’t forget.”

 

Louis furrows his eyebrows and frowns. “It doesn’t mean-“

 

“I’m honestly about to slap you, and don’t think that I won’t, because I still haven’t forgotten that time you spilled Coke all over my Docs.” Louis smirks. “Why do you find it so unbelievable that Harry likes you? He obviously does, and you saying he doesn’t won’t change that. He thinks you’re amazing, Lou. I’ve seen his face when he looks at you, and I think he may believe you hung the stars in the sky," Zayn says. “I would understand if you had commitment issues or something, but you don’t. You want a relationship with him, but now that it is here dangling in front of your face to grab, you’re avoiding it. Why? He kissed you, Louis. Go kiss him back.”

 

Louis shakes his head, but Zayn raises a hand threateningly, eyebrows raised, so Louis jumps off of the bed to escape him. Zayn spreads out over the bed to prevent Louis from coming back. “I’m not letting you back on. And I’m going to push you out the door and lock it and not let you back in until you go find Harry.”

 

Louis opens his mouth to protest, but then Zayn’s words finally hit him. He thinks you’re amazing, Lou. I’ve seen his face when he looks at you, and I think he may believe you hung the stars in the sky. Louis swallows hard. It doesn’t make any sense. All those stories about Harry taking girls home from a party and then never calling them and breaking their heart – those can’t be lies. There is just too many for it all to be fake. But what Zayn is saying about Harry thinking he is incredible – that sounds almost exactly what Harry said about the person he loves.

 

“Holy shit,” Louis whispers. The person he loves. “He told me he loved me. Zayn, I gotta go.” Without another glance back, Louis flies out of the room, almost leaving behind a sonic boom he is going so fast, and is a pace below sprinting as he makes his way down the hallway and out of the building. Louis wishes he could run faster, because now every second without Harry is a second wasted, and he needs to see him now.

 

Finally, after what seems like an eternity but in reality is only a few minutes, Louis finds himself standing in front of Harry’s door. This time around, it doesn’t take him nearly as long to knock on the door. Only after his hand falls back down to his side does Louis wonder what he is going to say. But, shit, that doesn’t matter right now, because he is going to kiss Harry again. For real, this time.

 

The door opens a crack, and Harry stands behind it, his hair messed up like he either rubbed a balloon on it or has been pulling at it, his eyes half-lowered against the bright lights of the hallway, a stark contrast from the pitch black from inside his room. “Louis?” he asks, sounding skeptical of his own eyes that it is actually Louis standing in front of him. Louis knows that feeling all too well.

 

“If you don’t open the door right now I’m going to knock it down myself.”

 

Harry cracks a small smile and backs away from the door after opening it wider, allowing Louis room to get in. He turns to flick on the light switch, but when he does, he doesn’t get enough time to turn fully back around before Louis is crowding up against him, pushing him back into the wall. Harry blinks rapidly down at Louis, his mouth opening and closing repeatedly.

 

Louis laughs. “Are you going to kiss me, then?”

 

The next second, their lips are connected, and Harry is spinning them around so that Louis is the one pressed back against the wall, trapped by Harry’s larger body. Harry’s hands are shaking; Louis can feel them on his waist, while Louis’ own hands are clamped around Harry’s curls, tugging the other boy impossibly close. Harry groans at the little tugs Louis gives him, making Louis want to pull all the harder to make those noises again.

 

It is unbelievable how well their lips fit together – Louis’s thin ones and Harry’s plump ones. Even their bodies slide together in a way that shouldn’t feel familiar, but does, with Harry’s huge hands on Louis’ small waist.

 

Louis would be lying if he says he hadn’t spent hours thinking about what it would be like to kiss Harry, but he couldn’t have thought up the way Harry flicks his tongue across Louis’ bottom lip then draws it back in, daring Louis to open up. Louis lets his mouth fall open, but before Harry can push his tongue inside, Louis bites down on his bottom lip, not hard, but not gentle either, reveling in pleasure at the moan that that draws out of Harry. He soothes the bite with his tongue, swiping it along Harry’s lips then pushing inside his mouth.

 

His mind is completely short circuiting, and the only thing Louis can think is Harry Harry Harry Harry, and every sense is heightened, so that he can hear Harry’s little noises, and can feel his fingers where they found a bare strip of skin where Louis’ shirt rides up, and can taste the strawberry gum on Harry’s tongue that he always chews.

 

“Lou,” he gasps, pulling away far enough so that he is just out of Louis’ reach, where the smaller man is pinned against the wall by Harry’s hands. “Lou,” he says again.

 

“Harry,” Louis says, eyes never once leaving Harry’s lips that are tinged a dark red where Louis bit them and slick with spit.

 

“Fuck, Lou.” His head falls forward again, his forehead resting against Louis’, but when their lips meet again it is less rushed – not slow, just not frantic. “You finally got my hint, then?”

 

“Shut up and kiss me, you fool.”

 

Louis would have been content to stay in this room forever pressed up against the wall, kissing Harry until they both die of old age, but eventually they fall short of breath and have to break apart. The hallway, usually loud with either shouting or TVs, is silent, and Louis can’t help but think that the whole world is holding its breath, waiting to see what will happen next.

 

Harry’s hands cup Louis’ face into them and he drags his thumbs along every bit of Louis’ face, his cheekbones, his lips, his eyebrows, his jawline, like he is studying every part of it, committing it to memory. “I can’t decide whether I want to kiss you again or if I want to sit down and ask you why the hell you’re kissing me in the first place.”

 

Louis tilts his head to lay more comfortably in Harry’s hands, a small smile plastered permanently on his face. “Maybe we could move to your bed.” His eyes fly open after the words are out, and he fumbles to backtrack. “Not – I mean, not do anything, I just – to talk, I meant – I-“

 

Harry breaks him off with another kiss that lasts more than a few minutes. “My bed it is, then.”

 

Permission granted to touch Louis, Harry is using every opportunity to take advantage of that permission, and even though his bed is not five steps away, when he pulls away to let Louis off the wall, he leads him over with one hand on his waist and the other on his bicep. Louis sits down after Harry with a grin still on his face.

 

“I don’t even know where to start, I-“

 

“Wait,” Harry says. “C’mere.” Making grabby hands at Louis, he spreads his legs out to make room for Louis, who happily obliges, climbing into his lap and sitting sideways so that his arm is against Harry’s chest and he can rest his head on Harry’s shoulder. “Better,” Harry says with a wink.

 

Louis rolls his eyes. “You’re a liar, you know that? Zayn told me you did notice me before the film festival.”

 

The tips of Harry’s ears go red, but he does not try to deny it. “It’s true. I don’t know how you didn’t notice me staring at you in English, since I practically had to turn in a complete one eighty to look at you.” Louis leans up to connect their mouths for a few seconds, just because he can.

 

“I noticed you too.”

 

Harry laughs. “I know that, silly.” He noses at Louis’ temple, making Louis scrunch his nose up in protest.

 

“I don’t understand.”

 

“Hmm?” Harry hums.

 

“Why you like me. Why you noticed me in the first place.”

 

“Because you’re you,” Harry says. “I explained this to you a few nights ago, why I like you.”

 

Louis smiles. “The guy I was describing – that was you, too. In case you didn’t realize.”

 

“Good to know that you’re not kissing me for no good reason, then.”

 

“Shut up.” Louis hums contently when he feels the rumble of Harry’s laugh reverberate through his body, and raises a hand to thumb at Harry’s lips.

 

He can think of a million times that he wanted to sit down and talk to Harry before, but now they are actually talking about their feelings, Louis can’t think of a single thing to ask. He is content to just sit with him and kiss him touch him. Then he remembers why he came here in the first place, and Harry must feel either the spike of his heartbeat or the tension in his muscles, because he presses a close-mouthed kiss to the corner of his eye, and whispers, “What it is?”

 

Louis swallows, debating internally with himself whether or not to say it. “Do you love me?” he blurts out, regretting it immediately, and goes to pull away from Harry, but Harry wraps his arms around his waist and pulls him back down into his lap.

 

“I thought that was obvious.”

 

“I don’t-“

 

“You don’t have to, Louis. Don’t feel like you have to say you love me back if you don’t. If you ever say it, I want you to actually mean it.”

 

Louis shakes his head. “No. I was going to say I don’t understand. But I do. I love you, I mean.” It is surprisingly easy to say. The words don’t get caught in his throat on the way out, like he thought they would, and he doesn’t want to run for the hills when he says it. It feels like any other normal sentence, maybe because Louis knows how true it is, except for Harry’s face breaking into a huge smile and pulling Louis closer to kiss him.

 

“Say it again,” Harry says, pulling away long enough just to say those three words.

 

“I love you,” Louis giggles against his cheek. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

 

“I love you,” Harry responds.

 

“I love you,” Louis says.

 

Somehow it turns into a contest of who can say I love you in the most ridiculous accent, and Louis ends up spread out on the bed with his head in Harry’s lap, and his stomach hurts from laughing so much. They must have each said it over a hundred times, but each time the words come out of Harry’s mouth, Louis can feel his heart jump and swell a few sizes with happiness.

 

He falls asleep that night fully clothed in his day clothes on Harry’s bed, curled up against the other boy in the middle of one of their conversations, struggling to keep his eyes open but eventually passing out from exhaustion. Unconscious, Louis can’t feel it, but Harry presses a kiss to each of his closed eyelids, whispers “I love you,” one last time, then pulls the covers over both of them, and falls asleep with a smile on his face.

 

+++

They make it official the next day, but just with their luck, they only have one full week to spend together on campus before term ends and they go home for the summer holiday. Louis tries not to think about that and spends most of his time pushing the thought of being separated from Harry away by kissing him, but Harry makes them talk about it, and eventually they agree that they will spend a few weeks their family before trying to meet up and spend some time together.

 

Christmas without Harry was awful, but now that Louis knows if Harry was here with him now they would be kissing, summer is unbearable. The social butterflies they are, his sisters are hardly ever home, and Jay goes to work Monday through Friday, leaving Louis either driving his sisters places or alone in the house, watching TV and moping.

 

Only a week in and Louis is about three minutes from getting in his car and driving all the way to Holmes Chapel to be with Harry. Skyping with him isn’t the same as actually being there with him, and Harry can hardly find time to be alone to Skype anyway. Anne, who has both kids gone all year, has developed severe Empty Nest Syndrome and constantly wants to be with Harry, and normally Louis would not mind, would find it cute, in fact, but it’s a bit awkward trying to talk to your boyfriend when his mother is sitting right next to him.

 

He is in a near comatose state, bleary-eyed with boredom, when his laptop dings in his lap with an incoming Skype call. Louis mutes the TV and accepts the call. He grins when Harry’s face appears along with a sandy-colored cat, which looks not all that pleased to be held up in front of a computer screen.

 

“This is Dusty,” Harry says, pressing a kiss to the top of the cat’s head.

 

“Cute,” Louis says.

 

“Who? The cat or me?”

 

“Hmmm.” Louis pauses like he is debating it, then says, “Both. But you may be a bit cuter. No offense, Dusty.”

 

Harry raises Dusty’s paw in a little wave. “None taken,” he says in a high-pitched voice, and God, he is so endearing Louis might just die from it.

 

“Stop tormenting the cat, Harold.”

 

Dusty disappears in an instant, free from Harry’s grip. Harry repositions the laptop so that Louis can see his face more clearly, smiling softly. “How have you been, babe?”

 

“Okay. It’s nice to see my sisters and mum. How are you?”

 

“Great. Robin took us bowling yesterday and I crushed everyone else. You should’ve seen me! Although if you were there, I probably would have let you win.”

 

“Hey,” Louis protests. “If I was there, you wouldn’t have to let me, I would do it on my own. Don’t underestimate my skills, Styles.”

 

Harry raises his hands in mock defeat. “Never.”

 

Louis frowns. “I wish I was there with you.”

 

“I know,” Harry sighs. “My mum yelled at me the other day cause we were at a restaurant and I wouldn’t stop looking at my phone to text you. She was saying that she wanted to meet you, but she isn’t so sure now, because if my face lights up so much when I’m not around you, it must be blinding when I’m with you.”

 

Louis can almost feel his heart melting in his chest. Louis remembers that day. He had gone to pick up Daisy and Phoebe from their friends house and got caught in the middle of a makeover session, ended up with a face full of makeup, and had sent a multitude of selfies to Harry, who was having lunch with his family. A blush leaps onto his face with an embarrassed smile with the thought that Anne might have seen all those pictures. “Does she…”

 

“What?”

 

“Does she want to meet me?”

 

“Of course,” Harry says.

 

“That’s what my mum has been saying, too. She wants to meet you when we’re ready.”

 

Harry must hear the hesitation in his voice, because he doesn’t push it and ask when they will be ready, just says, “Whenever you want, then, Lou. We’re not going on vacation this year so we can make any time work.”

 

Louis picks idly at his cuticles, chewing on his bottom lip. He wants to meet Harry’s family and he wants Harry to meet his family, but he isn’t sure if now would be too fast. Sometimes Louis still can’t believe he is dating Harry, and he does not want to screw things up by rushing into it too fast. But Harry seems eager to introduce Louis to everyone, too, even if he is hiding it, because even through a webcam Louis can see the hopeful tilt to his mouth and the look in his eye like he is waiting for Louis to say something. “Right now,” Louis says, and it is worth it to see Harry’s face light up with a huge smile.

 

“Now? This week?”

 

“Now.”

 

“Okay,” Harry breathes. “Okay, yeah. Wh-Who first? Do you want me to come to Doncaster or you come to Holmes Chapel?”

 

Louis wants to go there, wants to make sure Harry’s family approves of him before integrating Harry into his home life, but he also wants Harry with him as soon as possible, and since Louis watches his sisters on weekdays, he would have to wait for the weekend to drive over. “You come here. If you want. It would be easier that way. Is that okay?”

 

Harry nods, smiling. “Perfect.”

 

“I’ll have to ask my mum again, but I think she took the day off on Friday, so if you want to drive down Thursday night or Friday morning and we have the whole weekend.”

 

“Thursday night it is then,” Harry says, and Louis laughs. “Should I get a hotel room somewhere?”

 

“No,” Louis hurries to say. “We have a couch, and…my bed, is like, open. For you. And me. Or just you. Whatever.” Louis shrugs, face burning in embarrassment, but Harry grins.

 

“Sounds great, Lou.”

 

They talk for about an hour before Harry says he has to go, but before he does, he makes sure Louis knows he loves him, and Louis says it back without hesitation.

 

+++

 

Louis wakes up on Thursday morning already restless. It takes him a moment to place the cause of the feeling, but when he remembers that tonight Harry is coming, he leaps out of bed and flies into the bathroom to get a shower.  It is only ten in the morning, but wanting to look as good as possible for Harry, it very well make take Louis a few hours to get ready, and Harry said that he will try to be in around dinnertime.

 

After a shower, Louis spends close to twenty minutes trying to pick out an outfit. He gets frustrated after the fifth rotation of outfits and pulls on a ratty T-shirt and basketball shorts, then goes to find one of his sisters to recruit them for help. He finds Lottie first, lying on the couch watching cartoons, a bowl of cereal in her lap. Louis flops down next to her, careful not spill the cereal, and says, “Lottie, my dearest sister.”

 

Lottie makes a face at him. “What do you want?”

 

“Help.”

 

“Well, obviously. With what?”

 

“Picking out an outfit to impress my boyfriend.”

 

Lottie sighs. “Fine. Let’s go.” She follows Louis up the stairs into his bedroom, her mouth dropping open when she sees the clothes strewn everywhere. “God, Louis, you’re worse than me. Was there a tornado in your closet or something?”

 

“Please just help. We’ve only got-“ Louis glances at the clock. “five hours.”

 

Lottie bugs her eyes at him. “Oh my God, Louis, aren’t you overreacting? You would look fine whatever you wear.” Under normal circumstances Louis would say something about that last line, but these are not normal circumstances, so he shakes his head vigorously and starts picking clothes up off the floor to show Lottie.

 

“What about these? Or are they too tight? Do you think Mum would make me change?” Louis waves a pair of black jeans in the air.

 

“I assume you’re trying to show off for him, so no, they’re fine. And Mum can't make you change, you're twenty one years old.” She picks at a pile of clothes on his desk, rummaging through it to look for a suitable shirt. “Mum said we’re going out to dinner, right?” Louis nods. “Okay, then here.” She tosses a plain grey shirt at him, and Louis catches it, frowning down at it.

 

“It’s just a T-shirt.”

 

“Yeah, but it’s loose, so you can see your tattoos and simultaneously piss Mum off and impress Harry.”

 

Thoroughly convinced with that argument, Louis shrugs, and ushers Lottie out of his room so he can change. Doing his hair takes another hour, so by the time Louis is completely ready, he only has four hours to blow before Harry comes. They drag by more slowly than Louis thought possible, and at the two hour mark he contemplates calling Harry and telling him to hurry up, but Lottie steals his phone and tells him not to make an idiot of himself, so he doesn’t.

 

Finally, finally, Jay gets home and disappears into her room to get changed for dinner, and any moment now Harry should be pulling in. Stumbling over each other, just as excited as Louis is, Daisy and Phoebe run into the living room from where they were sitting in the front room and squeal, “Harry’s here!”

 

Louis is up in an instant, trying not to run as he pushes past the girls to the front door. He can’t control himself when he opens the door and sees Harry, though, and breaks into a run, shouting his name. Harry turns, throwing his bag back into the back seat, and stretches his arms open. Louis jumps into them, wrapping his legs around Harry’s waist, burying his face in Harry’s neck, so that every inch of his is pressed against Harry, every sense completely enveloped in the other boy.

 

Harry spins them around in small circles, and Louis thinks they probably look ridiculous, like they are trying to act out The Notebook or something, but right now he doesn’t really care. Laughing into the kiss, Louis connects their lips, and although the kiss is not heated, it feels intimate. With their foreheads and noses pressed together, Louis cannot look Harry in the eye without going cross-eyed, so he settles for staring at his lips. “I love you,” he mumbles.

 

“I love you too,” Harry says. “and I would love to kiss you some more, but you mum is watching us from the front door.” Louis blushes like mad as Harry sets him down, and waits until he has his bag, then intertwines their fingers and leads Harry up to the door.

 

Almost too embarrassed to meet his mother’s eyes, Louis watches as Jay pulls Harry into a quick hug. He thinks he sees her whisper something in his ear, but it is too quiet for him to make out what it was. “Mum, this is Harry. Harry, this is Mum.”

 

“Call me Jay,” she says with a smile.

 

“Nice to meet you, Jay,” Harry nods.

 

“Nice to meet you too, dear. Louis, why don’t you take him to get situated and I’ll see if the girls are ready to go.” She turns back into the house, leaving Harry and Louis alone on the front step. Pressing one last kiss to his mouth, Louis steps through the door, tugging Harry along with him up the stairs and into his bedroom.

 

Harry drops his bag onto Louis’ bed as Louis shuts the door. Once the door clicks shut, he crowds Louis against the door, his breath warm against Louis’ neck. Louis shivers when Harry’s lips connect with the skin beneath his jawline, and he lets him suck there for a few minutes before pushing him away. “Wait till after dinner, Harry. I’m not wearing a turtleneck in the middle of summer.” Harry leaves his neck alone after that, but goes after his lips instead, taking Louis apart with just his kiss. They break apart about fifteen minutes later only because Jay shouts for them. Louis jumps back, a blush burning his face, and grabs onto Harry’s hand again. “C’mon and meet my sisters.”

 

“And brother?”

 

“And brother, but he can’t talk and still shits his diaper, so.”

 

Harry claps a hand over his mouth to stifle a laugh, making Louis laugh at the sight of him. He missed being able to do that, make Harry laugh like that. It’s only been a few weeks, but he has missed Harry so much it is unbelievable.

 

Lottie is the first one who notices when they come down the stairs. She glances up from her phone, and without missing a beat, says, “I hope you know, Harry, you made Christmas absolutely unbearable cause all Louis did was whine about you and mope around.”

 

Harry raises an eyebrow. “Sorry?”

 

“Hmm, apology accepted,” she says, then pulls Harry into a hug, which is in a bit of an awkward position since he is still holding Louis’ hand. The rest of his siblings greet Harry too and introduce themselves, but Harry seems most interested in the tiny twins, even letting go of Louis’ hands to hold Dorris.

 

“Well,” Jay says. “at least know you know he’ll never break up with you, cause he would miss the twins too much.”

 

Harry makes an offended face, his eyebrows twisting inward. “I would never break up with him anyway.”

 

Louis grins, and silently thinks that neither would he.

 

+++

 

For it only being the first time Harry has met his family, they click surprisingly well. Harry and Lottie bond over their mutual interest of teasing Louis, Fizzy likes him because he told her he has been to the Victoria Secret Fashion Show and she can ask him about it, the twins are fascinated by his vast knowledge and skills in the art of braiding hair, and Jay loves him simply because Louis does.

 

Louis is squashed in between Jay and Harry, the four older girls on the other side of the booth and the little twins on booster seats at the end. It puts him in a perfect position to lay his head on Harry’s shoulders while still holding a conversation with his family, and this time when Louis thinks I could get used to this it does not scare him. What it does make him do, is snuggle closer to Harry and hum contentedly when Harry drapes an arm around his shoulders.

 

Jay smiles at that, shaking her head slightly with a laugh. “You two are sickeningly sweet.”

 

“Just sickening,” Louis hears Lottie mumble. He smirks.

 

“No, Mother, we’re young and dumb and in love, and we’re ready to take on the whole world.” Harry nods seriously, his eyebrows raised in agreement.

 

“Well take on the world away from us, where you won’t make me throw up my lunch,” Fizzy grumbles.

 

“You’re just jealous, my dear sister. Don’t worry, someday you will find someone to be sickeningly in love with too.”

 

Fizzy starts to protest, but the waitress comes back then and hands Jay their bill, so she settles for glaring coldly at Louis from across the table.

 

“Can we go for ice cream?” Daisy asks, bouncing in her seat. The other sisters chime in their consent, so Jay shrugs and herds them all into the car. She frowns at Harry and Louis, who are still standing outside.

 

“Aren’t you coming?”

 

“We’re gonna get a taxi back to the house. Harry has been driving all day and just wants to lie down.”

 

“Okay,” she says. “We should be back in around an hour. Do you have money?”

 

“I do,” Harry says, pulling a wallet out of his back pocket.

 

“Nonsense, dear. Here, Louis.” She hands him a ten pound note then climbs into the car with a wave, shutting the door behind her.

 

Harry smiles once they are gone and pulls Louis into his chest, wrapping his arms around his waist and resting his chin on the top of Louis’ head. “I love your family,” he murmurs.

 

“Yeah?” Louis asks. He smiles into Harry’s chest. He had known they would get along well, because not only is Harry able to be friends with nearly everyone on this planet, but his family knows how happy Harry makes him, but he had still been scared something would go wrong and they would hate him and they would be forced to break up or run away together or something else extreme. It’s nice knowing that the one you love is able to so easily integrate into your family life. “You love me more, though, right?”

 

“I love you more than anything on the Earth,” Harry replies. “Your family is no exception.”

 

+++

 

As promised, Louis barely has time to get through the door before Harry is pinning him back against it. He squeaks in surprise, blushing at the noise, but it makes Harry’s lips curve into a smirk, carving deep dimples into his cheeks. He dips his head down so his lips are hovering above where Louis’ jaw connects to his neck, and Louis can feel his hot breaths on his skin. Agonizingly slow, Harry presses his lips down and sucks hard, his teeth sometimes scraping along the skin, but always soothed by a swipe of his tongue.

 

“H-Harry,” he says, fumbling to form words over his tongue that feels like a dead weight in his mouth. “Wait. Just – my room. Go to my room.” Harry doesn’t make any move to acknowledge his words, but he stumbles back a bit, lips still attached to Louis’ throat, to allow Louis to guide them up the stairs. They move at a snail’s pace, indulging in a few minutes make out session halfway up the stairs, Louis straddling Harry with his knees next to Harry’s chest, but eventually they make it up to Louis’ room.

 

Harry tugs Louis along to the bed and pushes him down with an admirable determination. Louis feels something tug deep in his stomach just at the sensation of being manhandled, and it does nothing but grow when Harry climbs on top of him.

 

“Wanna blow you,” Harry whispers. “Right here, right now. Bet I’m the first person to ever do this here, hm?”

 

Louis squirms under Harry. The front of his jeans are already becoming painfully tight, but Harry is in a position that Louis can’t get any friction, and Louis almost screams in frustration. “Yes. Yeah, you are.”

 

“I’ve got to make it enjoyable, then. Go nice and slow,” Harry mumbles in his ear. He takes Louis’ earlobe between his teeth then moves down to his lips, pushing his tongue in and licking deep into his mouth. He grinds down in a slow rhythm, and it’s hardly anything, but it’s something, and it makes Louis throw his head back in a drawn out moan.

 

Suddenly the weight of Harry disappears off his body, and his head snaps back down to find him. He is staring up at Louis with a devilish grin on his face, and his eyes are blown wide with lust, but there is still enough room in them for that mischievous twinkle. Harry lowers his head to trace the outline of Louis’ hardening dick in his jeans with his tongue. Louis’ hips jerk upwards involuntarily, and Harry gives him a look before grasping Louis’ hips and pressing them down into the mattress. “Gonna suck you off, but only if you don’t move. Hear me?” Louis nods frantically. “I said, did you hear me?”

 

“Yeah, fuck, Harry,” Louis gasps. It takes all the willpower in his body not to snap his hips forward again when Harry pulls his head back and unzips his jeans, pulling them down slowly, dragging his fingernails along Louis’ skin as he goes, leaving behind raised red marks on Louis' legs. While Harry tugs the jeans over his ankles, Louis goes to pull down his pants, but Harry clamps a hand around his wrist and pulls it up away from his pants and pins it above his head. “Told you not to touch,” he growls.

 

Louis shivers. This isn’t the first time Harry and he have been sexual – they had gotten more than few handjobs and blowjobs in during that week together, but Harry had never been so dominant. Louis isn’t complaining, though; if Harry wants him to simply lay there while he sucks his dick, by all means, do so. And even if he won’t admit it with a gun to his head, Louis has always loved being manhandled. “I won’t.”

 

Harry knee-walks back up Louis’ body, straddling him, to connect their lips again. Harry still fully clothed, there is one too many layers between them, and Louis tugs at the hem of Harry’s shirt, trying to get it up over his head. Harry gets the hint and pulls back long enough just so Louis can pull the shirt off then dives back in, sucking at Louis’ bottom lip and grinding his hips in figure eight motions.

 

“Haz,” Louis groans.

 

“Do you want me?” Harry asks. His voice is deep, and he whispers it against Louis’ ear, and it goes straight to his dick, making the effort sitting still even harder. (No pun intended.)

 

“Fuck, yeah, I want you. Haz, please, I want you.”

 

“Gonna suck you so good,” Harry purrs. He slides back down, yanking Louis’ pants with him. Louis’ dick bobs free and he gasps at the sudden freedom and can’t help the twitch of his hips when Harry lets his warm breaths puff over his dick. Harry keeps his mouth not an inch away, staring up at Louis through his eyelashes. Louis’ breath shudders on its way out, his entire body trembling with the anticipation. Then Harry dips forward and wraps his mouth around the tip of Louis’ dick, sucking hard at it, wrenching a strangled moan out of Louis.

 

Unable to move, Louis fists his hands around the covers on the bed and throws his head sideways to stifle a moan on the pillow, all while Harry takes him deeper into his mouth. Once he has him all the way in, Harry flattens his tongue along the bottom of Louis’ dick and hums. The vibration shoots through Louis’ dick, and he can’t hold back the moan that tears itself out of his body. Harry seems pleased, at least, because after a quick glance up at Louis, he pulls back off a few inches then takes Louis back in, bobbing his head enthusiastically like he wants nothing other in the world than to be sucking Louis off.

 

Louis has to physically control himself, pressing his own hips into the bed, in order not to move. He concentrates on staying still and not coming in an embarrassing short amount of time, but Harry is doing that thing where he swipes his tongue along the vein on the underside of Louis’ dick, and is staring up at him with red-rimmed eyes, so within a few minutes, Louis is gasping with the effort to control himself.

 

Harry pulls off, leaving Louis’ dick unattended to and slick with spit, and Louis writhes under the bigger man, nearly screaming for his mouth back on him again. “You gonna come?” Harry breathes. Louis, unable to speak because his teeth are digging into his bottom lip, nods vigorously. “Hmm,” Harry says, flicking his tongue out again to lick tiny stripes at the tip of Louis’ dick. “No.”

 

“Please,” Louis sobs. “Need to come. Please, Harry.”

 

Leaving his dick behind, Harry ducks down even farther to bite at the inside of Louis’ thighs, at the sensitive skin there. Louis nearly comes right then and there, but the sudden dominance Harry is displaying is what stops him. “Harry,” he sobs again, and finally Harry looks up at him, and the look in his eyes confuses Louis. There is lust there, but something else. Hesitance, maybe. He frowns. “What?”

 

“I want you to come.”

 

“Then let me,” Louis says, daring to push his hips down towards Harry, throwing his head back against the pillow again.

 

“I want you to come while I’m inside you.”

 

Oh. Louis freezes, his eyes shooting down to look at Harry, who is still staring up at him. He swallows hard. This is new, then, both for LouisandHarry and for Louis. Not that he hasn’t had sex before, but he has always been on top, has always been the one doing the actual penetrating.

 

“We don’t have to if you don’t want,” Harry says with a newfound serious tone to his voice. Louis chews on his lip. He does want, but this would be his first time, and he doesn’t want to embarrass himself and turn Harry off because he doesn’t know how to do it right. Plus this is his childhood bedroom, but that only comes as an afterthought. Louis doesn’t really care where they are as long as he is with Harry.

 

“Will it hurt?” he whispers.

 

Harry crawls up to lay next to him, pulling Louis onto his side so that they are face to face. “I’ll be gentle. It won’t hurt.”

 

Closing his eyes, Louis catches Harry’s lips with his own and kisses him for a few moments, before pulling back and resting his forehead against Harry’s. “I trust you. Do you have, like…I don’t have anything.”

 

Harry nods and untangles himself from Louis’ body to stumble on unsteady legs over to where his bag is laying on the floor. It only takes him a minute to find a condom and a bottle of lube, and after he tosses it over to the bed he strips out of his jeans and pants, letting his dick free. Louis stares at it, half mesmerized and half horrified. He had seen it before, had had it in his mouth for God’s sake, but his viewpoint is a little different when it is about to go inside of him.

 

“Harry…”

 

Climbing back onto the bed and straddling Louis, Harry uses one hand to cup Louis’ hand into a kiss and the other to stroke Louis’ dick, which is going flaccid from the nervousness of the whole situation. “Are you sure you want to?”

 

“Yeah,” Louis says. “Just – it’s so big, Harry. I don’t think it can all fit.”

 

Harry laughs softly against Louis’ cheek. “It’ll fit, babe. I’ll go slow. Trust me.”

 

“I trust you.”

 

Harry nods. He leans back and rips open the packaging on the condom then pulls it over his dick. Louis flinches at the snap from the bottle of lube being opened. “Go slow, Haz.”

 

“I will, baby. Ready?” Louis nods, and the next moment Harry’s finger, cold and coated in lube, is running a line from the back of his dick to his bum, then pushing into his hole. Louis gasps and wiggles around, trying to get used to it. Harry, pushing his finger in and out of Louis, leans forward to catch him in a kiss. “Okay?”

 

“Okay.” He laughs, not able to hold it in, and throws his hand over his mouth to stifle it, but Harry already heard it and stares quizzically down at him.

 

“What?”

 

“It’s just so absurd. I’m having sex with you. You don’t know how many times I’ve thought about doing this.”

 

Harry makes a stupid face, raising his eyebrows suggestively, as he pushes a second finger in. “Believe it or not, I’m pretty sure I thought about it more.”

 

“I got off more than once thinking about it, though, so.”

 

Harry’s head falls forward onto Louis’ chest. “Fuck, Lou, you can’t say things like that. Gonna make me come just from the thought of you touching yourself thinking about me.”

 

Louis twists uncomfortably as Harry adds another finger, but he smiles. “That’s the point of sex, Harry.”

 

Harry laughs, and Louis raises a hand to pet his hair, but it falls back down to his side when Harry lifts himself back up. He reaches over Louis, still fucking Louis with his fingers, to grab the bottle of lube where it had fallen. Louis unscrews the cap for him and Harry pours some more over his dick, maybe a bit more than necessary, and pulls his fingers out to use them to hold Louis’ waist steady, pulling Louis towards him so he is almost on his lap. He looks at Louis with a lifted brow. Sucking in a deep breath, Louis nods, and Harry pushes in the tip, making Louis squeak with the sensation.

 

“Haz,” he whimpers, eyebrows furrowed. Harry ducks forward to connect their lips, pushing in slowly but steadily, stretching Louis open with a burn. It does send an occasional flash of pain through his body, but it’s not a bad kind of pain, more like a satisfying kind, making Louis crave more. It just keeps going, though, and Louis almost curses Harry and his big dick, but he loves it too much to do that. Finally, after what feels like ages, he feels Harry bottom out, his waist pressed against Louis’ bum, and both of them stay motionless, letting Louis get adjusted to the feeling.

 

Harry pulls off the kiss so he can see as he runs his thumb over Louis’ eyebrows, eyes running over the arch of them, then trailing down to thumb at his lips. “You’re so beautiful,” he whispers, sounding struck by it. Louis can’t see how – he is inexperienced and not making the most attractive faces right now, but when Harry tells him that he believes it without a doubt. “How do you feel?”

 

“Like I’ve got a huge cock inside me,” Louis says with a breathless laugh. “Okay, though. You can move now.” Harry nods and pulls out a bit, thrusting back in gently. Each thrust goes in a bit harder than the last, building Louis up to being used to the incessant feeling. A sheen of sweat has appeared on Harry’s collarbones, and Louis runs his fingers along it, tracing the pattern of one of the swallows on his chest. He wants to lean forward and suck a lovebite into it, but he doesn’t really think he can move right now.

 

Harry twists his hips, something flashes white with pleasure behind his eyes, and Louis throws his head back in a long moan. “Fuck, Haz, right there.” Harry pushes into the same spot, and the same feeling flashes through Louis, making him grind down into the other man. He can feel it in his whole body, never like before, where the pleasure was confined to his dick only. It’s like having an out of body experience, really, and Louis doesn’t know how to handle it except swivel his hips against Harry, and he is too out of it to even try and contain the high-pitched noises that fall from his mouth.

 

Harry finds a steady rhythm and thrusts in and out of Louis with an occasional groan, his hands tightening around Louis’ waist, surely leaving bruises. Every thrust hits Louis’ prostate, sending him reeling and closer and closer to his orgasm, vision blurring in pleasurable tears. He grabs hard onto Harry’s shoulder, forcing the man to look up at him.

 

“Haz, I’m gonna-“

 

“Go, then,” Harry whispers, and his voice is so deep and gravelly, that along with that, a few thrusts later Louis is coming hard, shooting in between his and Harry’s chests. If he thought the feeling of someone clenching around him to their own orgasm was marvelous, this is a whole other experience, and it takes Louis a while to realize the loud moan, almost shout, is coming from him. He is dazed when he comes back to his senses, finding Harry slumped on top of his chest, obviously coming down from his own orgasm.

 

Louis takes a strand of his hair between his fingers. “Harry.”

 

Harry, with what looks like a great effort, looks up at him. “Yes?”

 

“Wow.”

 

Harry laughs. “Wow, indeed. You're amazing," he says. "We need – when is your family getting back, again?”

 

“Any minute now, probably,” Louis says. “They won’t bother us, though. My mum will tell them we’re taking a nap or something.”

 

Harry nods and, after pulling out gently, making Louis wince at the drag, rolls over onto his side and pulls Louis with him, burying his face in Louis’ neck. “Can we take a nap?”

 

Louis presses a kiss between his eyebrows. “Hold on.” Harry frowns as Louis rolls out of the bed, waddling uncomfortably around the discomfort in his bum, and walks over to the closet. Harry whines when he sees when where Louis is heading and wads up a pillow, throwing it and hitting Louis in the back.

 

“Don’t put on clothes. I like cuddling naked.”

 

“’M not getting clothes.” Louis rifles around until he finds the bag, unzipping it and pulling out the camera. He walks back to the bed, straddling Harry over the covers he has pulled over his body. Harry raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t protest when Louis turns the camera on and lines it up, holding it so it is hovering just above Harry’s chest. Unsure of what expression to make, Harry keeps his face neutral as the shutter clicks and it flashes in his face.

 

“I wanna be able to look back when we’re old and remember today.”

 

Harry nods. “Don’t I get anything to remember it by?” Handing the camera over to him, Louis cheeses, squeezing his eyes shut and scrunching his nose up, and waits until he sees the bright flash. He takes it back and sets it on the bedside table, then pulls the covers down and crawls in next to Harry, humming happily when the younger man presses a multitude of kisses all along his face. Harry murmuring, “I love you,” and a car pulling into the gravel driveway outside is the last thing Louis hears before he lets sleep overtake him.

 

+++

When Louis wakes up, he does so wrapped up in a pair of strong arms, held close to a warm body, and although he is still half unconscious, he has never been happier. Blinking open his eyes, he finds the room dark, but he can still make out the body next to him, already awake and looking over at Louis with half-shut eyes.

 

“Hi,” Harry says. His voice sounds a little scratchy, and Louis smirks with rememberance of why it is like that.

 

“Hi.”

 

“How do you feel?”

 

“A bit sore, but other than that, good. How do you feel?”

 

Harry’s teeth flash white in the dark room as he grins. “Fine, but I’m not the one who had a massive cock up my ass.”

 

Louis whacks his arm, rolling his eyes and groaning in exasperation. “Stop being so vain.”

 

“’S true, though,” Harry says with a shrug.

 

“Shut up and get dressed.” He reaches over to where his jeans are laying in a crumpled pile and pulls his phone out of the back pocket. “It’s only 8:00. My mum probably wants up to go hang out with them.”

 

“That’s fine.” Harry pulls himself out of bed and walks over to his bag, stark naked, and rummages through it to find something to wear. He is pulling on a pair of shorts when he notices Louis staring and laughs, raising an eyebrow. “We can go for round two later, y’know.”

 

Louis swallows. “You got to give my bum some time to recover.”

 

Harry winks exaggeratedly at him, making Louis roll his eyes. “Give me your sweatshirt.” Harry tosses it over to him, and Louis pulls it over his head. When he stands up, it falls to mid-thigh, and he smirks, twirling in a circle, when he sees Harry staring. “Like this on me?”

 

“Yeah,” Harry says. “Here.” He hands Louis a pair of shorts (actually Louis’, this time). Louis pulls them on, steals a kiss, then flounces out the door and down the staircase.

 

Harry must have gotten dressed at the speed of light, because when Louis stops at door to the living room, Harry runs into his back and has to grab onto Louis’ waist to steady him. Jay glances up at the movement, turning away from the TV, and scoots over to make room for them on the couch. Daisy and Phoebe are snuggled up on one side and Jay is sitting on the other, which makes not much room for Harry and Louis in the middle, but somehow they fit, and if Louis has to sit a bit in Harry’s lap to do that, then he tries not to think about the fact that neither of them are wearing pants under their shorts.

 

Jay looks back at the TV, which is playing an episode of a cartoon the twins like. “Did you boys have fun today?”

 

She meant it innocently, but a blush leaps onto Louis’ face the moment she speaks, and he hides his face in Harry’s chest. Jay raises a questioning eyebrow at Harry, but he ignores that and nods. “We had fun, huh, Lou?”

 

“Yes,” he says, voice muffled.

“The girls had fun, too. They really like you, Harry. Don’t screw this up, cause you’ll break not only my Louis’ heart but the rest of my children’s too.”

 

Louis groans. He had expected the “don’t break his heart or I’ll break your face” from Zayn (and they had gotten it) but he thought his mother might wait more than one day to warn Harry about that.

 

“I won’t,” Harry says. “I love him.”

 

“I know.”

 

They talk as if Louis is not sitting right next to them, but it doesn’t bother him. His mother is one of the two people on this planet who love him the most, the other being Zayn, and to hear her saying she knows how much Harry loves Louis blows his mind. He never expected to find love this young, especially not in Harry, but he got it, and Louis doesn’t really believe in God, but he sends a silent thanks out every night thanking whoever may be out there for Harry.

 

He hums contentedly when Harry starts stroking his hair, scraping his fingernails along Louis’ scalp in a way he knows the older man loves. Curled up into Harry’s side with his sisters and mother spread out on either side of them, Louis is happy, and Louis has never felt more at home.

 

**Author's Note:**

> my tumblr is unrequitedpining


End file.
